2009 Greenhouse Gas Savings Study Report - Alberta Used Oil ...

It should be noted that significant data gaps exist in the amounts (percentages) of
materials going to each facility. Only collection data from M&R Environmental, Merlin
Plastics, and Safety-Kleen were received, with the remaining percentages having been
calculated/assumed, applying the assumptions stated above. With more complete data
from other Processors, better estimates of where the materials were actually transported
during the year could be calculated.
Used Oil
It was assumed that all used oil going from Collector to Processor was transported in
large tank trucks with 8,000 gallon capacities (Seneca Tank, 2010). For large tank trucks,
a fuel consumption value of 0.395 L/km was used (NRCan, 2009). The only exception to
this concerns the railway transportation for used oil that occurs from Safety-Kleen's
facility in Delta, BC to their re-refinery in Breslau, ON. The transportation distances
from Collectors to the Delta facility were separated from the distance of rail transport
from the Delta facility to the Breslau re-refinery, in order to account for the difference in
fuel consumption between trucks and rail locomotives. For rail transport, a fuel
consumption value of 0.828 L/km was calculated, based on a value of
525 gallons/24 hours (Vantuono, 2002, p. 4) and an average speed of 100 km/hour (Via
Rail, 2010). Due to the variable and large capacity that freight rail can offer, it was
assumed that all the used oil that went to the Breslau facility in 2009 was accommodated
in one trip, making the total capacity of the train on this trip equal to 2,450,030 L. With
tank cars having an average capacity of over 113,563 L (30,000 gallons) (UTLX, 2008),
this is equivalent to a train with 22 cars.
Oil Filters
It was assumed that all oil filters traveling from Collector to Processor and subsequent
end users were transported in 42 US-gallon oil barrels (barrel height assumed to be
twice its diameter) in large trailer trucks with 107 m3 (3,800 ft3) capacities
(ShipNorthAmerica Transportation, 2007).
For oil filters traveling to Processors, the number of filters that can fit into this volume
was based on a weight of unprocessed filter per barrel ratio calculated by M&R
Environmental based on their 2009 collection data. With the ratio between weight and
number of filters from the BCUOMA 2009 collection data known (Table 2.1), the truck's
capacity for filters in this arrangement was calculated. Filters are crushed/stripped at
the Processors, thus allowing increased capacity for filters traveling to the metal brokers
and steel mills. A percentage reduction in volume of 20 percent was assumed to
accommodate this fact.
071620 (2) 14 CONESTOGA-ROVERS & ASSOCIATES