Volume 1 Issue 24

SSY Base Oil Shipping Report

Adrian Brown is away. His column will reappear in the June 20 issue of Lube Report Americas.

Trafigura Acquires Blend Plant in Argentina

Trafigura Group Pte. Ltd. closed last month on the purchase of most of Pampa Energias downstream assets in Argentina. The transaction includes a lubricants manufacturing plant in Avellaneda, Buenos Aires, Trafigura reported in a press release.

PQIA Issues Consumer Alert on Two Brands

The Petroleum Quality Institute of America issued consumer alerts on two motor oil brands -Mileage 365 and Q Motor Oil - saying testing of five samples indicated the products could cause harm to virtually any car or truck currently on the road, and each products label fails to identify the company responsible for it.

STLE Offers Brainstorming Exercise

Last month's annual meeting of the Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers featured hundreds of technical sessions where presenters talked about their latest research. One session differed by offering attendees a chance to brainstorm about problems facing the industry.

From Other Editions of Lube Report

Briefly Noted

Shell Lubricants and AirFlow Truck Co. completed a cross-country test drive of the Starship Initiative truck – a prototype Class 8 vehicle — on May 24. The road trip included testing technologies to help reduce fuel use and emissions when hauling heavy loads, including low viscosity lubricants, and allowed Shell to test its Rotella T6 Ultra 5W-30 full synthetic engine oil in a cutting edge vehicle before its introduction to market. Oxea will raise off-list prices by 5 cents per pound in North America and Mexico by $110 per metric ton in South America for isononanoic acid and for heptanoic acid; and in North America and Mexico by 6 cents/lb and in South America by $130/t on 2-ethylhexanoic acid.