History

Recycling Since 1947!

Lenz Oil was started in 1947 by Fred Lenz, Sr. I'm his son John Lenz. My son Mike Lenz and Mike's son Matthew Lenz, have all worked at Lenz Oil. Now a fourth generation family Business! In 1947 A part time petroleum waste oil pick-up recycling route was bought from the local milkman. In the early days of waste oil recycling, the only way to "recycle" the oil was by road oiling it for dust control. As new technologies emerged, waste oil could be recycled in better ways. Today our petroleum waste oil is recycled by distilling it into a reprocessed fuel oil or by a vacuum distillation process turning it into reusable lube oils.

The fuel oil we make works just as well as virgin fuel and saves generally around 20% over "virgin" or "new" fuel oil. Another benefit is the energy consumed by processing the used oil into fuel or industrial oils for reuse is very low compared to refining it from crude oil. Over a 70% savings! So you wind up saving energy through lower processing costs in addition to "using over" the old oil. That cuts our consumption of "virgin" or "new" oil by up to 100%.

More recently, we have started collecting used vegetable oil. These oils are processed, and sold, as feedstock to bio-diesel producers.

We have also stayed in the road maintenance business all along. Today asphalt emulsions have become the main road maintenance tool due to their lower costs and lower environmental impact.

As of this writing the sixth generation of Lenz boys (and girls) have been born! I'm sure they will bring even more good ideas on how to recycle and reuse the various liquids we all use! We appreciate the community working with a locally owned, family business all these years!

-John Lenz