Valvoline has launched a new NextGen™ brand which includes 50% content of re-cycled oil.
Valvoline NextGen Conventional Motor Oil Image: Valvoline |
The new brand is available as two products, NextGen™ Conventional and MaxLife™ Motor Oil and will initially go on sale in the US from the beginning of April. The aim of the new lube is to re-use a larger amount of the 3bn quarts of oil currently consumed and drained every year by US cars and trucks.
Currently the majority of used motor oil is either disposed of - in some cases illegally into the surrounding environment - or re-cycled for industrial lubricants. The Valvoline products take this used oil and, using the same hydro-treating process as crude oil refining, remove all the additives and contaminants before adding virgin base oil.
According to Valvoline, the base oil element has an almost infinite life, with only the additives wearing out within the oil requiring regular drain and change. According to the company, if all US car onwers changed to an oil similar to NextGen, new oil demand would reduce by 1.6bn quarts annually or enough barrels to stretch from New York to Los Angeles and back.
Valvoline is not the first company to use this technology, with Safety-Kleen introducing its 100% recycled engine oil product, EcoPower in 2008.