Volume 14 Issue 18

SSY Base Oil Shipping Report

None of the United States, European or Asian markets has created much excitement over the past two weeks, and the long Easter weekend ensured that most regions remained low-key. U.S. Gulf Rates have been immobile on virtually every U.S.-based trade lane, chiefly because there has been no pressure either way to cause them to change. U.S. Gulf-to-Far East had been looking rather promising prior to Easter, but since then there has only been the occasional paraxylene cargo fixed, along with some eth...

Shell to Pull Plug on Pernis Base Oil

Shell intends to stop API Group I base oil production at its refinery in Pernis, Netherlands, by early 2016, a company spokesperson told Lube Report. The Pernis plant has 7,100 barrels per day (370,000 metric tons per year) of Group I capacity, according to LubesnGreases. Pernis is a submunicipality of Rotterdam. Shell plans a phased closure of the base oil plants two trains. The spokesperson said the intention is to close train two at the end of 2015. The closure timing for train one is still u...

O'Brien to Bid Adieu to Ashland

Jim O’Brien, the 59-year-old chairman and CEO of Ashland Inc., announced last week he will retire from the company he has led since 2002. In his tenure as chief executive, O’Brien transformed Ashland from a petroleum refining company with holdings in highway construction and chemical distribution into an $8 billion specialty chemical supplier. One of its steadiest anchors throughout has been Valvoline, the lubricants business unit that he ran as president from 1995 to 2001 and which ...

Tatneft II/III Base Oils Almost Here

Tatnefts 190,000 ton per year API Group II/III base oil plant at its new Nizhnekamsk refinery will commission in test mode by September and could start normal operation by Jan. 2015, the company told Lube Report on Monday. When the equipment installation is ready we will start a three-month long test streaming in several batches. It will be a substandard product not intended for sale. A certified product will not be ready until we get the environment protection licenses, a Tatneft spokesperson t...

Q1 Earnings Results Mixed

NewMarkets Afton Chemical additives subsidiary and lubricant supplier Quaker Chemical each reported increased sales and slightly decreased profits for the quarter ending March 31, compared to the year-earlier quarter. Meanwhile, profits rebounded for South Koreas SK Lubricants and S-Oil. Afton Chemical Afton Chemical posted a $96.2 million operating profit during 2014s first quarter, down 5.7 percent from $102 million in the year-earlier period. The petroleum additives segment reported $574 mill...

Briefly Noted

Infineumbroke ground April 28 for its new lubricant additives plant in Zhangjiagang in China’s Jiangsu province and established Infineum (China) Co. Ltd., its second Chinese wholly foreign owned enterprise. Southwest Research Institute launched the Advanced Engine Fluids consortium – membership will cost $100,000 per year – to better understand fuel and lubricant chemistry and its effects on engine combustion.