Thailand: OilPure Technologies targets Thai market

The global economic crisis and crude price fluctuations provide a timely opportunity to introduce industrial oil recycling, a Thai invention that treats lubricant oil, to Thailand after its success in the United States, the Bangkok Post reports. He said that in the current economic downturn, competitiveness is a survival tool so any technology that saves costs should be successful. A plant is first audited to detect the characteristics of its used oil and its repair record from bad oil quality. The price of the oil recycling machines varies from $6,000 to $60,000, but the company is also preparing to offer oil treatment service to small companies that use less than 10,000 liters of industrial oil yearly. The company is in discussions to sell machines to a medium-sized power plant, a sugar refinery and a paper producer. “The technology should be user-friendly, energy-efficient and discharge has to be minimal to reduce waste management costs,” a source from Thai Paper said. The local lubricant industry is valued at about 60 billion baht (US$1.76 billion) yearly based on 500 million liters of usage. (July 15, 2009)