A fire at the Amalie Oil Co. bulk oil storage facility in Tampa, Fla., last Wednesday caused no serious injuries but nearly $2 million in damages. At about 1 a.m. a fire ignited inside the boiler room and threatened the surrounding structures, said Tampa Fire Rescue captain Bill Wade. According to a Tampa Fire Rescue report, the facilitys large oil storage tanks suffered fire damage and many thousand gallons of product were damaged by the heat of the fire. The lubricant manufacturer stores motor...

Industrial Enterprises of America, parent of Pitt Penn Oil and Hi-Tach Oil, on Thursday said it is slashing its workforce, writing down obsolete inventory and discontinuing some product lines as part of consolidation efforts under new management, though its lubricants product lines are not expected to take a hit. It should not impact the product line of either Hi-Tach Oil or Pitt Penn Oil, David Zazoff, director of corporate communications for Industrial Enterprises, told Lube Report. Basically,...

With an emotional Congressional hearing scheduled for this morning, featuring family members of miners killed in Augusts Crandall Canyon, Utah, mine collapse, sympathy may push the U.S. House of Representatives to move forward on legislation that could cause unintended damage to the metalworking fluid industry, the Independent Lubricant Manufacturers Association warns. Earlier this week ILMA, based in Alexandria, Va., urged its members to contact their legislators to oppose a provision in H.R. 2...

The U.S. Department of Labors Occupational Safety and Health Administration has issued citations for fines totaling $122,400 to Calumet Shreveport Lubricants and Waxes LLC for alleged violations of federal health and safety regulations relating to a fire at its Shreveport, La., refinery on March 26, 2007. Were reviewing it, and we are working closely with OSHA on that, Jennifer Straumins, vice president of investor relations for Calumet Specialty Products Partners, told Lube Report. It was in re...

BASF on Monday outlined plans to expand its plant for low molecular weight, highly reactive polyisobutene, marketed under the Glissopal brand, at its Verbund site in Antwerp, Belgium, raising capacity by 25,000 metric tons per year to a total of 100,000 mt/y. Start up of the upgraded plant, which responds to demand for HR PIB for use in lubricant additives, is scheduled for March 2008. This investment is BASFs response to the increasing global demand for Glissopal, said Hartmann Leube, head of s...

Neste Oil has appointed new executive vice presidents to three divisions as part of a round of internal job rotations, effective Oct. 16, and created a new specialty products division that includes production and sale of base oils and gasoline components. Neste is one of the key merchant players in the API Group III base oil market, and its Porvoo refinery has a Group III capacity of 4,670 barrels per day. The company appointed Kimmo Rahkamo, currently executive vice president, biodiesel, as exe...

Safety-Kleen Systems Inc. and Quaker Chemical Corp. have joined forces to offer companies in the metalworking industry – including smaller manufacturers that dont typically enjoy the benefits of chemical management services – a blend of products and services from both, including Quaker coolants and periodic visits from Safety-Kleen metalworking specialists. This program is offered to all Safety-Kleen customers who do metalworking, Vanessa Lepice, director of marketing for Plano, Texa...

Dow Europes line of specialty surfactants will now be marketed and distributed to its European customers by Rotterdam, Netherlands-based chemical distributor Univar N.V. according to a statement announcing the partnership that went into effect Oct. 1. Under the agreement, Univar will distribute Dowfax Anionic, Tergitol Nonionic and the Triton Anionic and Nonionic product lines in Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Great Britain, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Norway and Sweden. [...