Adrian Brown is away. Adrian Brown is a senior market analyst for chemicals and base oils with SSY Shipbrokers, London. Information about SSY can be found atwww.ssyonline.com. Adrian Brown, in the U.K., can be reached atfix@ssychems.comor by phone at +44 12 0750 7507. In the London office SSYs Ian Roberts can be reached atfix@ssychems.comor +44 20 7977 7560 and in Singapore Jordi Maymi at +65 6854 7127.

Thanks to significant new capacity on the U.S. Gulf Coast, the countrys refiners in 2015 decanted their greatest volumes of base oils since 2006. Domestic base oil production reached 65.6 million barrels for the year, according to data released last month by the federal Energy Information Administration. The 2015 total included 56 million barrels of paraffinic base oils and 9.6 million of naphthenic base oils. This was only the sixth time since 1981 – the earliest year for which the govern...

Chevron Phillips Chemical Co. said yesterday it reached a final investment decision to expand low-viscosity polyalphaolefin capacity at its Cedar Bayou plant in Baytown, Texas, by 10,000 metric tons per year. The company said the expansion will allow it to meet increasing demand for high-quality base stocks for automotive and industrial lubricants, as demand for higher energy efficiency and high-performance lubricants continue to grow. The project also improves safety and efficiencies while redu...

When Royal Dutch Shell and Fuchs Petrolub opened Russias first foreign-owned lubricant factories, in 2012 and 2013, respectively, both companies wanted to use their plants to boost sales in the giant lube market. Two and three years later, both facilities operate at fractions of capacity – a situation that some blame partly on political and economic factors. Shell utilizes only 30 percent of its 180,000 metric tons per year blending complex in Torzhok, Tver Oblast, and Fuchs runs its 40,00...

Tanzania will require lubricant importers to obtain licenses beginning in May, as part of an effort to stem the flow of substandard products, a government official said. Importers of lubricants to Tanzania will have to obtain import permit licenses from the Tanzania Bureau of Standards, said Tanzanian Minister for Industry, Trade and Investment Charles Mwijage. According to the minister, the new directive aims to stem the rising incidence of substandard lubricants in the country. Rhoida Andasumi...