Chevron Lubricants Lanka Plc has begun work on its new lubricant blending plant at Sapugaskanda, Sri Lanka with an investment of LKR1.9 billion (US$15 million). The new plant, expected to be commissioned during the third quarter of 2014, will have the capacity to produce 45,000 metric tons of finished lubricants annually in a single shift operation.

Wilmar International, a leading Asian agribusiness, and Elevance Renewable Sciences, a specialty chemicals company, announced recently that they have begun shipping commercial products, including specialty chemicals used in lubricants and lube base stocks, to customers from their first world-scale joint venture biorefinery, located in Gresik, Indonesia.

Transport Topics has issued its 2013 list of the 100 largest Light & Medium Truck Fleets in North America. UPS, AT&T, FedEx, PepsiCo and Comcast lead the list as the top five. This new first-year list is in addition to their annual lists of the 100 largest for-hire trucking fleets and the 100 largest private trucking fleets in North America.

Suncor last Wednesday announced that Boris Jackman is retiring on September 30, 2013 and that Kris Smith will be promoted to EVP, Refining and Marketing, effective September 9, 2013. Smith will be responsible for industrial, commercial and retail marketing of refined products under the Petro-Canada brand, including Petro-Canada Lubricants worldwide business as well as responsibility for operations at Suncor's four refineries.

Valvoline (Ashland Consumer Markets) reported a strong fiscal third quarter. While overall lubricant volumes increased 1 percent from the prior year and year-over-year sales decreased 1 percent to $513 million, EBITDA rose 26 percent to $86 million. On a sequential basis, lubricant volume rose 5 percent and sales gained 4 percent.

The Synthetic Heat Transfer Fluids Chart is the twelfth of a 12-chart series of the Sixth Edition of our Synthetic Industrial Lubricant Cross Reference Chart Series. This 12-set series consists of fully synthetic lubricants marketed by hundreds of worldwide lube manufacturing & marketing companies and industrial equipment OEMs.

• Chevron Increased Its Group II Base Oil Posted Prices by 25 CPG, Effective July 26
• Calumet to Increase All Its Naphthenic Base Oil Prices by 15 CPG, Effective July 30
• Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc. Announces 2013 Second Quarter Financial Results
• Pilot Chemical Company Completes Its Largest Infrastructure Investment in Company’s History at its Middletown, Ohio Facility
• Dow Reports Second Quarter Results
• BASF Reports Second Quarter and First Half 2013 Results