Thanks to a new sensor system developed collaboratively by Professor Andreas Schütze and his research team at Saarland University and a group of industrial project partners, unnecessary oil changes could well be a thing of the past. The new system can provide operators of combined heat and power plants with reliable continuous feedback on the current state of the oil. And the system can also warn the operator if the condition of the oil suddenly deteriorates. The oil flows through a small measuring cell where it is analysed spectroscopically to record the condition of the oil. The method offers numerous benefits: it is better for the environment, it lowers operating costs and it simplifies maintenance scheduling.