SIGAUS, the body entrusted with the collection and treatment of used oils resulting from vehicles and machinery, has compiled the largest collection of information covering its 9 year history, making available to interest groups a comprehensive breakdown of used industrial oils in Spain, and on how this residue is handled by the SIG, through the simultaneous launch of its Sustainability Report for the year 2015, the report “Used Industrial Oils in Spain 2015” and the web platform for the “Used Oil Observatory”.  

The report  “Used industrial oil in Spain 2015” analyses the dispersion resulting from the generation of used industrial oils in our country, due to economic and demographical factors, meaning the company is obliged to travel  major distances on many occasions in order to collect just a small amount of this hazardous residue, thus converting the process in loss-making and meaning that the financing provided by SIGAUS is essential.

With the aid of more than thirty maps and graphs, the report relates the production of used oils with the uneven territorial distribution of population and economic activities in Spain, characterised by the dual nature of concentration – dispersion. Likewise, it breaks down the almost 70,000 registered producers, their location and activity sector, duly analysing the operations involved in collection (amount, distance and frequency), and dimension of the coverage of the logistical model in place at SIGAUS in areas of particular difficulty (rural medium, mountainous), or economic or industrial activity and the existence of other basic services (pharmacy, health, education).
 

Finally, the document underlines the environmental protection that the collection service for this residue signifies in areas at significant environmental risk, and in rural environments next to these spaces or hydric resources, in which collect is precisely more complex and costly.
 

Main findings

 

Below are some of the findings compiled through said report, and which clearly bear witness to the complexity of collection, and the capacity of the SIGAUS logistical model to cope with current demand levels:

- Concentration-dispersion of used oils: To collect half of the used oils requires transport to merely 100 localities. However, to collect the most widely-dispersed 25% a complex logistics operation is required capable of reaching more than 4,400 different municipalities.

- Fragmentation of production points: In Spain there are almost 70,000 registered producers of used oils, compared to 22,000 pharmacies and 11,000 petrol stations. 81% of the total producers did not exceed 2,000 kg generated in 2015.

- Adaptation of collection: The most frequent amount collected was 200 kg, and more than half did not exceed 500 kg (around two drums). Furthermore, in half of the localities worked with only small amounts were handled on an occasional basis, which did not however reach the same amount of all the used oil collected in Madrid Metropolitan Region, constituting environmental tasks of great wroth that make SIGAUS’ model the standout collection method.

- High generalised cost: More than 18,000 production points and 50,000 tons of used oils (a little more than a quarter of the total amount in both cases) involved handling at more than 100 km distance. And this amount is greater when the quantities to be collected are smaller.

- Service coverage: SIGAUS collected used oils from areas that account for 97.9% of the population, 99.6% of economic activity, 99.3% of industrial activity, and 99.6% of registered workshops in Spain.

- Environmental protection in high-risk areas:  SIGAUS collected the same amount of used oil in the Autonomous Community of Madrid as in 1,378 rural localities located next to protected spaces, and an even greater amount in 1,785 rural localities located next to hydric resources. In both cases, the points served created amounts below the average, yet required journeys of around 110 km.