Chevrons $1.4 billion, 25,000 barrels per day API Group II base oil plant project in Pascagoula, Miss., is on budget, and on track for startup in the fourth quarter of 2013. We will be mechanically complete, and go through our commissioning and startup in the fourth quarter, Patti Leigh, general manager for Chevron Lubricants base oil group, told Lube Report in an exclusive interview on Monday. As we line out the exact details of what that means – you have to build the waxy intermediate s...

Led by strong vehicle sales, Russian automotive lubricants demand is expected to grow around 3 percent annually, reaching 765,000 metric tons by 2017, a study by consultancy RPI found. The passenger car lubes segment will lead this growth, with expected increases of about 4 percent per year through 2017, according to Moscow-based RPIs new study, Actual Engine Oil Consumption by Motor Vehicles in Russia. The study found that passenger car motor oil demand growth is influenced by changes in pass...

Heritage-Crystal Clean obtained a required air permit this month to allow it to expand feedstock input capacity at its Indianapolis rerefinery by about 50 percent to improve profitability of its oil business segment. The rerefinery now has capacity to recycle up to 50 million gallons of used oil and produce up to 30 million gallons of API Group II base oil, or about 2,000 barrels per day. If and when we expand the input capacity to 75 million gallons per year, we would have production capacity ...

Essar Energy reached an agreement with its base oil customers that will allow it to shut down the base oil plant at its Stanlow, U.K., refinery within the next couple of months, a company spokesman confirmed to Lube Report. The 5,060 barrels per day API Group I base oil plant is part of a fuels refinery that Essar bought from Shell in August 2011. Weve been working towards stopping base oil production at Stanlow for some time as part of its push to increase margins and profitability, the spoke...

Shell Chemical LP may expand its Geismar, La., petrochemical facility by adding an additional linear alpha olefin unit to meet growing global demand for products such as synthetic lubricants and lubricant additives. The proposed expansion still has several key milestones to achieve prior to Shell reaching a final investment decision. Shell did not disclose the cost in its recent announcement. It would be the fourth LAO unit at the Geismar plant. The potential new LAO unit’s planned capac...

Fuchs Petrolub AG reported 2012 earnings of 207 million (U.S. $273 million) on full-year sales revenue of 1.8 billion, up from 2011 earnings of 183 million on sales of $1.7 billion. For 2012, earnings per share rose 13.3 percent to $2.90 per ordinary share and $2.92 per performance share. The Mannheim, Germany-headquartered independent lubricant blender also announced that, pending supervisory board approval, it proposed a dividend of 1.30 per preference share and 1.28 per ordinary share for fi...

Europe had another busy week, although not quite as frantic as the previous week. The U.S. Gulf has picked up, and there are fewer open ships. Asia is very tight on space, and rates have jumped again. U.S. Gulf of Mexico Many of the ships that were open in the U.S. Gulf last week have now fixed away, and because the region had a reputation as the wrong place to have a ship open, owners have preferred not to send across further vessels. Consequently, the resupply of tonnage is minimal, yet deman...