Proposed changes to mineral oil standards

Introduction Recent actions of leading international standards committees have set the stage for significant changes that will impact anyone who purchases and uses mineral oil....

byAndrew T. HOLDEN


Introduction

Recent actions of leading international standards committees have set the stage for significant changes that will impact anyone who purchases and uses mineral oil. The term recycled mineral oil refers to all products that rely on some process of retreatment to convert oils which have already been used in service into a reusable product. While one major international committee has decided to create a new and separate standard to address this emerging group of products, the other leading international committee has suddenly pivoted from an identical position to one that will instead merge recycled oils into their current unused oil standard. Leading global refiners of unused mineral oil believe this is the wrong path forward and advise against it.

Recent Activity

A Task Group from ASTM’s D27 Committee began the process of seriously addressing recycled oils in 2015. The D27 committee, which is made up of members on the ASTM International D27 Committee and focuses on the process of recycling, determined that all recycled oils should not be treated the same and should be separated into two groups. D27 recommended that reconditioned and reclaimed oils should be grouped and separated so that they could be addressed using guidance from IEEE while D27 would undertake the effort to write standard specifications for re-refined oils.

In May of 2015, the members of the ASTM’s D27 committee weighed the impact of integrating recycled oils into the established unused oil standard and determined that the most appropriate path forward would be to create a new standard specific to re-refined oils rather than integrating them into the existing D3487 standard. This decision will ensure that the unused oil standard will retain its integrity while providing recycled oils a separate and equal opportunity to develop and refine a new standard intended specifically for their product. A task group has been assigned the responsibility for writing the new standard.

Simultaneously at IEC, the Technical Committee TC10 was also addressing the recycled oils and foreshadowed the ASTM decision when they determined that a separate and equal standard for re-refined oils only was the most appropriate path forward. In March of 2014, a new stand-alone standard titled IEC 62701-2014, “Fluids for electrotechnical applications – Recycled mineral insulating oils for transformers and switchgear,” was published. Ironically, the same month that the IEC 62701 standard was withdrawn without a replacement being offered, the D27 committee of ASTM made their decision to start a separate standard for re-refined oils.

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