Its been established in many threads here that Safety-Kleen re-refines oil, and that oil ends up as various engine oils brands on store shelves, in both Canada and the US.
In Canada, there is a lot of that oil on discount store shelves - Wal-Mart has 'Tech 2000'; Canadian Tire has 'Autolab'; and Zellers has 'Auto Prix'. From my observation, that oil takes up at least 50% of the shelf space for motor oils in these stores. Also, Wal-Mart now offers a $18 oil change using this oil. This oil is packaged in very cheap, bland packaging, and you wouldn't know it was a re-refined oil, except for the price, which is about half that of virgin oil. I'm assuming b/c of this availiablility, it is used quite a lot in Canada.
In the US, it seems that there is a lot less use of re-refined oil. It seems like it is marketed as a specialty 'environmental' product, not just a cheap oil brand. The packaging of it seems to bear that out:
http://www.ac-rerefined.com/index.html
From what I have read here, it is not as availiable as a store brand at any stores, nor do people on this board seem to think it is worth it - it doesn't seem to be much cheaper there than here. Up here, as mentioned, it is up to half as cheap as virgin dino, and an oil change with it is a full $6 cheaper than the next nearest package.
I'm not really sure where I'm going with this, it just seems like the Canadian market treats this as just a cheaper product and option for oil, but no fuss is made about it being an environmental product. I don't know if that means Canada is more environmentally friendly than the US in this regard, or if we are being given a bill of goods b/c we are getting fleeced on the price of regular oil.
Thought/comments on this? If I'm wrong about how availiable re-refined oil is in the US, and how much it is used by the civilian population (I'll exclude fleet/cop use), please let me know....
In Canada, there is a lot of that oil on discount store shelves - Wal-Mart has 'Tech 2000'; Canadian Tire has 'Autolab'; and Zellers has 'Auto Prix'. From my observation, that oil takes up at least 50% of the shelf space for motor oils in these stores. Also, Wal-Mart now offers a $18 oil change using this oil. This oil is packaged in very cheap, bland packaging, and you wouldn't know it was a re-refined oil, except for the price, which is about half that of virgin oil. I'm assuming b/c of this availiablility, it is used quite a lot in Canada.
In the US, it seems that there is a lot less use of re-refined oil. It seems like it is marketed as a specialty 'environmental' product, not just a cheap oil brand. The packaging of it seems to bear that out:
http://www.ac-rerefined.com/index.html
From what I have read here, it is not as availiable as a store brand at any stores, nor do people on this board seem to think it is worth it - it doesn't seem to be much cheaper there than here. Up here, as mentioned, it is up to half as cheap as virgin dino, and an oil change with it is a full $6 cheaper than the next nearest package.
I'm not really sure where I'm going with this, it just seems like the Canadian market treats this as just a cheaper product and option for oil, but no fuss is made about it being an environmental product. I don't know if that means Canada is more environmentally friendly than the US in this regard, or if we are being given a bill of goods b/c we are getting fleeced on the price of regular oil.
Thought/comments on this? If I'm wrong about how availiable re-refined oil is in the US, and how much it is used by the civilian population (I'll exclude fleet/cop use), please let me know....