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| Home > Resources > Hazardous Waste > Oil Stewardship |
Oil Stewardship Dripping with ControversyThe three prairie provinces have had coordinated programs for dealing with used oil materials for many years. Collectively, they achieve strong return rates for oil and filters and moderate returns on the containers. They’re steadily working to improve their programs, to increase return rates and efficiency. British Columbia adopted a similar program in mid-2003 and works with the prairie programs on common promotion and program features. East of the Manitoba border, the used oil situation is a little slipperier. The Ontario government instructed Waste Diversion Ontario to prepare a stewardship program for used oil materials in March, 2003. Industry submitted a program that WDO rejected, due to controversy over the amount of used oil available for collection and the end uses for the used oil. WDO is looking for a proposal that specifies a differential incentive to oil processors to encourage higher end uses. (Western programs don’t pay incentives to oil processors. They give an incentive to collectors, who sell the oil to processors with government-approved end uses.) Industry has asked for clarification from the government on end uses. Quebec has formed a new organization, la Soci ét é de gestion des huiles usag ées (SOGHU) that began a used oil collection program November 1, 2004. SOGHU has adopted a similar program to that of the western provinces, and the five organizations are working together (see NUOMAC). Safety Kleen has challenged the SOGHU program in court, asserting that the program is inconsistent with the Quebec government’s waste reduction policies. Safety Kleen is a re-refiner of used oil and is concerned that the oil collected in the SOGHU program will be used for “lower” end uses. Safety Kleen has also established its own used oil collection program in Quebec, outside of the SOGHU program. It will be interesting to follow how these central-Canada issues turn out. (Source: March 2005 WasteWatch)
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