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البحـث الأول
مجلة النفط والتعاون العربي
161 العدد - 2017 أربعونالمجلد الثالث و ال
2016 أوابك العلمية لعام� ص لبحوث العلمية الفائزة بجائزة� عدد خا
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Collection and Disposal:
To support the industry, the Italian government established by law in 1984 "The
Statutory Consortium of Used Oil (COOU)", a non-profit making organization
made up of lubricants manufacturers, collectors and re-refiners to foresee the
collection of used oil, its testing and allocation to re-refiners, according to their
capacity or requirement104, and other users with priority of 90%1,4,104 to re-
refiners. COOU is also in charge of mapping out collection centres and regulating
their equipment and also those of the collection trucks in addition to licensing
collectors104.
COOU is financed by per ton contributions of its members in accordance with
their sales in the market whether virgin and re-refined. This has been introduced
by COOU to subsidize collection and re-refining with the agreement of the
lubricants producers. The contribution value varies year by year according to
some parameters including the price of the base oils.
In the early 2000s, contributions to COOU were 325 Euro per ton where 94 and
40 Euro is paid as subsidy to re-refiners and fuel plants respectively4. But the
contribution has been falling over time to 155 Euro per ton in 2010 104. In 2002,
collectors were paid 166.5 Euro per ton collected in addition to subsidies paid to
testing agencies1. The generators of used oils are obliged to give their collected
used oil without charge.
Additional advantage to re-refined products comes from a 50% reduction of the
excise duty applied to virgin lubricant, if the base oil is produced in Italy. The
European Union has requested Italy to ease this law to include imported re-
refined base stocks4. This tax relief is later abolished and replaced by a unified
duty on all lubricant base oils whether virgin or re-refined.
The success of COOU is measured by the increase in collected used oil where the
rate has increased from 42.6 to 48.7% of lubricants consumption in 2008 and
2009 respectively or 95% of the collectable used oils4. COOU website106 says that
5.378 million tons were collected between 1984 and now and the regenerated
used oil was 4.432 million tons or 82.4%. The base oils produced as a result were
2.49 million tons in addition to other products. In 2014, COOU collected 167
thousand tons where 91% were regenerated to produce 111 thousand tons of base
oils making 25% of Italy's base oil requirements106 . More than 56 thousand tons
of asphalt and gasoil were also produced. The maximum collection of used oil
was in 2006 at 216 thousand tons 106.