month shutdown at the island's primary disposal - Waialua Sugar Co.
"I can't get anybody to come down and take my oil," said Beverly Harbin, vice president of Hawaii Automotive Retail Gasoline Dealers. "All my tanks are overflowing. I'm storing it in 55-gallon drums and they're piling up all over the place."
Waialua Sugar, which burns most of the estimated 1.8 million gallons of used oil disposed of on Oahu each year, has been closed for maintenance and modifications since November. The company, which uses the oil to produce electricity, hopes to resume in several weeks.
Meanwhile, Unitek Solvent Services, Inc., the state's largest handler of used oil, has shipped 60,000 to 80,000 gallons of oil to the neighbor islands to ease the situation on Oahu.
"This is the worst it's been," said Blaine Yamagata, president of the company. "We've never had a situation where we had to ship so much oil off island."
The oil went to sugar plantations on Maui, Kauai, and the Big Island where used oil from those islands is also burned as fuel.
Industrial Technology, which collects and stores used oil, last month asked its customers to bear with a difficult situation. Those with extra storage space were told to expect only partial pickups.
Waialua Sugar is currently storing 100,000 gallons of oil, it's maximum capacity. The company hopes to convert molasses tanks used in former sugar production to add 50,000 gallons of storage space in about two weeks.
Meanwhile, as recyclers and haulers wait for relief, the island's heavy reliance on a single source of disposal is raising questions.
"We need to find some other disposal point besides Waialua Sugar," said Harbin, whose association has pondered shipping waste oil out of Hawaii and passing the cost on to customers.
"We charge customers 50 cents a quart to dispose of used motor oil. What's going to happen is that's probably going to quadruple if we have to ship it out of state."
Yamagata said the state could help by speeding its permit process that keeps asphalt companies from burning used oil. He estimated the companies, some waiting years for a clean air permit from the Department of Health, would use up to 800,000 gallons per year.
Waialua Sugar, which ended sugar production last year, is turning to increased power production this year.
The company last year sold about 20 million kilowatt hours of electricity to Hawaiian Electric Co. It hopes to triple output this year with the addition of bagasse burning capability.