A consortium of industrial companies and research institutions has just launched a new initiative called “GearOil-Loop”.
Each year, more than four million tonnes of lubricants are produced and used in the EU, and most still have a fossil raw material base. The new project aims to create advanced recycling technology for lubricants with a focus on gear oils. Its ambition is to put a circular economy in place where fossil-based materials are employed to their absolute limit, reducing reliance on resources that are not renewable.
The initiative assembles collaborators from a wide range of industries, including mechanical engineering, lubricant manufacturing and environmental research. Firms like Klüber Lubrication, Starke & Sohn, Schaeffler, SEW-Eurodrive and BASF accompanied by research organisations like ifeu and the Fraunhofer Institute are now working together to enhance the lubricant recycling process. To achieve their combined goal, the partners are enhancing not just methods of recycling processes but also lubricant formulations.
Present processes already allow operations to recycle around 40 per cent of waste oil after industrial use, which is then reprocessed to become base oils. Even though current technology doesn’t enable effective recovery of high-quality base material to produce high-performance products, the project leaders feel this figure can be improved.
The “GearOil-Loop” project addresses the issue through development of a recycling process at the same time as designing a gear oil that is specifically engineered for recyclability. A minimum of 50 per cent of the lubricants’ composition will be derived from recovered and recycled oil.
