OSS campaign against tax on recycled oil

The UK's largest waste oil recycling company is urging the Government to rethink its plans to introduce a new tax on recycled fuel oil this November.

The OSS Group is lobbying both Defra and the Treasury over the plans, which will see a tax of 9.29 pence added to each litre of recycled fuel oil, the same as the tax on virgin heavy fuel oil.

OSS uses waste lubricating oil, collected from UK garage and servicing centres, to produce a processed fuel oil (PFO) equivalent to virgin fuel oil and known as Clean Fuel Oil (CFO(tm)). According to the company it is the best environmentally sustainable means of dealing with some of the 800,000 tonnes of waste oil produced each year in the UK.

To date, such waste derived fuel oil has been free of tax however the plans according to OSS MD Andy McNair “could kill not only the market for recycled fuel oil but also remove the incentive for companies such as us to invest in leading edge recycling technology.”

He goes onto say:

"Government wants to encourage recycling. This will have the opposite effect. At present there is a reasonable price difference between the cost of virgin fuel and waste derived fuel. Adding this tax will increase the cost by approximately 30% and bring prices more in line with virgin fuels. The incentive for industry to use recycled fuel will be lost.

"Apart from cost, the top quality processed fuel oil burns more efficiently (customers use 5% less) and cleaner; for example a 35% reduction in sulphur emissions. And if waste oil isn't used as a base for a fuel, where's it going to go?