SAN DIEGO – General Motors has designed its Dexos licensing program to generate $35 million to $40 million required to develop up to seven new engine tests by 2014, plus up to $13 million per year for specification development, test maintenance and monitoring, end-user and installer education and quality monitoring in the marketplace. Eric R. Johnson of GM Powertrain in Milford, Mich., gave an update on GMs trademarked Dexos engine oil specification and licensing program at the Independen...

Tom Glenn has launched an independent oil-quality testing program, the Petroleum Quality Institute of America, and independent blenders are abuzz. Industry veteran Thomas F. Glenn, president of consultancy Petroleum Trends International and publisher and editor of newsletter Jobbers World, in mid-February launched the Petroleum Quality Institute of America to conduct random sampling of packaged motor oils, have the samples analyzed by an independent laboratory, and make public the test results....

MOSCOW – Russia’s base oil industry must embrace the latest refining technologies and increase operational performance to help turn around its general slowdown in base oil production, speakers said at a World Refining Association conference here last month. Several factors are driving the slowdown, including demand for high quality lubricants in the European markets, shifts in global base oil supply and trade routes, the worldwide recession, and growing usage of alternative lubrican...

Neste Oil last week started a planned maintenance turnaround at its Porvoo, Finland, refinery, which includes a base oil plant with 4,670 barrels per day of API Group III capacity. The maintenance work began April 6 and will continue about four weeks, Neste stated. Following that, the refinery unit start-ups will take another week. The Porvoo refinery maintenance turnaround includes the base oil unit, and we are making a normal turnaround maintenance and catalyst change in the base oil unit, V...

WD-40 Co. recorded $10.7 million in net income for its second quarter ending Feb. 28, up 161.5 percent from the same quarter in 2009. Earnings per share reached 64 cents per diluted share in the second quarter, compared to 25 cents per share in the year-earlier quarter. San Diego-based WD-40s fiscal year runs from Sept. 1 to Aug. 31. WD-40 overall posted net sales of $80.6 million for the second quarter, up more than 30 percent from 2009s same quarter. Second quarter sales in the Americas rose...

THE WOODLANDS, Texas – The ubiquitous paper box, properly called corrugated or fiberboard, provides a renewable and socially responsible shipping container and store display for motor oil, brake and transmission fluids and greases. Stan Lancey, chief economist with the American Forest & Paper Association in Washington, D.C., highlighted the benefits of paper packaging at the Petroleum Packaging Council spring meeting here last month. The overall forest products industry, including p...