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Tag: fatbergs
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Improper Cooking Oil and Grease Disposal Leads to Pollution
Proper cooking oil and grease disposal are critical to not only your city’s sewer lines but the overall health of our environment. When sewer pipes become clogged with cooking fats, oils, grease and other items rinsed down the sink and flushed down the toilet, that raw sewage then spills out and contaminates the local environment.
This was just the case recently when a fatberg clogged a sewer line and sent sewage spilling out into Wellington Harbour in New Zealand. “Unfortunately, the blockage caused some wastewater to overflow into the harbor. We encourage members of the public to avoid swimming in the area.” This contamination effects not only us but the local wildlife in the area as well.
Sewage Overflows are Toxic for Humans and Wildlife
Contaminants in the environment can look and smell pretty bad, but their impact goes beyond just aesthetics. Some pollutants resist breakdown and accumulate in the food chain. These pollutants can be consumed or absorbed by fish and wildlife, which in turn may be eaten by us. Chemicals can also get into sediments, impacting large coastal areas, threatening human health, and reducing the economic well-being of regions that depend on a healthy coastal environment (NOAA).
Proper Cooking Oil and Grease Disposal with Grease Hero
Since the inception of the Grease Hero drain guards, we have been on a mission to stop this toxic environmental pollution. We understand the lasting impact sewer overflows have on us, wildlife and our water supply, which is why we continually focus on ways to make disposing of cooking fats, oils and grease quick and easy for people cooking at home.
Our environmentally friendly Grease Hero drain guards are a simple solution to proper cooking oil and grease disposal. Simply set the drain guard in your sink’s drain, the counter, or a flat surface and pour your cooking fats, oils and grease directly from the pan into it. Wait one minute for the liquid to completely absorb into the recycled material of the drain guard and then dispose of it with your regular trash or at your local recycling facility.Recently, we also launched GreaseHero PLUS which is a storage system for Grease Hero drain guards. We understand that not every meal you cook will have enough oil/grease to fill the drain guard and you may want to store it to use again until it is completely full. This is where Grease Hero PLUS comes in. With a lid that tightly attaches to the base, you can store your drain guard without having to worry about any lingering odors in your kitchen. GreaseHero PLUS is made from recycled materials and is dishwasher safe.
Proper cooking oil and grease disposal is not only important for your home and neighborhood, it’s critical for the health of our environment, wildlife and waterways.
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Join our mission to save the environment. We aim to promote environmental, social and economic benefit, all while prioritizing the environment over our product life cycles… from the initial manufacture using recycled materials until final disposal.
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube.
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The Greasy Truth About Clogged Pipes
The greasy truth about clogged pipes is that we get them, none of us really like to talk about them and they are preventable. By taking simple actions in our home, we can limit the number of clogs we experience and drastically cut down on those plumbing bills.
Properly Dispose of Cooking Fats, Oils and Grease (Around the holidays and all year round)
Whether it is vegetable oil, bacon grease or turkey drippings they all need to be disposed of properly. When you send a pan of oil or grease down your sink, it doesn’t take long for it to adhere to the sides of your plumbing and accumulate. The oil and grease congeal and lock in food scraps as well. This turns into a hard blockage that restricts the flow of wastewater. When wastewater has nowhere to go it comes back into your home causing major property damage.
Wipe Out Those Mixing Bowls Before Rinsing
That butter, milk, cream and flour should be wiped clean from your mixing bowl before you wash it in the sink. These baking items tend to harden quickly and stick to the inside of your plumbing as well and emit a foul odor.
Depend Less on the Garbage Disposal
Garbage disposals streamline the dish washing process and make things just a little easier. The problem arises when you use yours a bit too frequently. The garbage disposal is a way to get unsightly items out of the kitchen quickly, however it is a major contributor to clogged pipes. The food that is rinsed in the garbage disposal is chopped up and then sent down your plumbing, some food though will get stuck inside your plumbing and cause the pipe diameter to narrow and eventually it becomes completely clogged.
Fatbergs Clog Sewers and Damage Neighborhoods
Entire neighborhoods can become flooded and damaged by a fatberg in the sewer line. Fatbergs in the sewer network grow very rapidly and eventually end up blocking entire portions of the sewer network.
They grow so fast because that one pan of oil or grease you rinsed down your sink, met up with other oil and grease your neighbors rinsed down their sinks. You can see how the issue grows exponentially. Once all of this fats, oils and grease meet up with food particles, wet wipes and other items flushed, it becomes hard as concrete and a major problem for sewer lines and water companies. Once a fatberg has blocked a section of a sewer line in your neighborhood, wastewater then gets pushed upward and flows out of drains and manholes into your neighborhood, homes, and the environment.
Put an End to Clogged Pipes with Grease Hero
Grease Hero is designed to be placed into the top of your kitchen sink drain, so you can quickly and easily pour the used cooking grease into it and then promptly dispose of it. It’s designed with recyclable materials to absorb the oil and grease waste and can be thrown out with your regular garbage. See Grease Hero in action on our YouTube channel. This one easy change in your kitchen cleaning routine will save you money from costly plumbing repairs, the city from expensive sewer damage, and our environment from deadly contamination.
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Join our mission to save the environment. We aim to promote environmental, social and economic benefit, all while prioritizing the environment over our product life cycles… from the initial manufacture using recycled materials until final disposal.
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How to Dispose of Bacon Grease
The aroma and sizzling sound of bacon cooking on the stove top in the morning is met with both excitement and hunger. Nothing quite compares to that crispy piece of bacon with your meal—whether it’s next to a pile of scrambled eggs or on top of a burger, there is no substitute. While we could go on and on about the delicious flavor of bacon, there is one thing about bacon that stumps many people—how to dispose of the leftover fat/grease after cooking it.
Never Dispose of Bacon Grease Down the Sink
Simply put, bacon grease should never get rinsed down the sink drain—not the kitchen sink, bathroom sink, or laundry room sink, no sink, ever. While bacon is a great component of a meal, the grease it leaves behind it a nightmare for your plumbing. When bacon grease gets rinsed down the sink, it mixes with cooler water and immediately begins to congeal (harden) and cling to the inside of your plumbing. In time, you will notice a foul odor coming from the sink because the congealed grease continues to collect more and more food particles.
While the majority of bacon grease will stick to your plumbing, some of it will inevitably make its way into your local sewer system where it will combine with other households cooking fats, oils and grease. For a moment, stop and imagine that your entire neighborhood sends pans of bacon grease down the sink, that adds up to a lot of grease. This grease meets in the sewers system and begins to form large pipe clogging culprits, commonly referred to as ‘fatbergs’. These masses are hard as concrete and grow rapidly in city sewers. To date, the largest fatberg uncovered was in London in 2017 and it weighed in at 130 tons and 250 meters long.
Once a fatberg has blocked a section of a sewer line, wastewater then gets pushed upward and flows out of drains and manholes into local neighborhoods, homes, and the environment. Right now, you are probably thinking “what about my home?” well this raw sewage flows out of sewer lines and can end up in your home. Insurance doesn’t always cover this mess either, which means that it could be an expensive problem to remedy.
As you can see, this popular food item can cause chaos in your home if not disposed of properly.
Responsibly Dispose of Bacon Grease with GreaseHero
GreaseHero drain guards are designed to be placed into the top of your kitchen drain or on your countertop. You can quickly and easily pour the used cooking fats, oils or grease into it, and then promptly dispose of the entire drain guard, instead of rinsing these harmful contaminants down the kitchen sink.
Our GreaseHero drain guard is made with recyclable materials to absorb the fats, oils and grease and can be thrown out with your regular garbage. Watch one in action on our YouTube channel.
We recently introduced GreaseHero PLUS to our product lineup for those meals where you don’t have enough used cooking oil/grease to fill and entire drain guard. GreaseHero PLUS is a self-contained storage system for our drain guards in which you can securely store your GreaseHero drain guard until it is ready to be tossed out or recycled. With a lid that tightly attaches to the base, you do not have to worry about any lingering odors in your kitchen. GreaseHero PLUS is made from recycled materials and is dishwasher safe. Learn more about GreaseHero PLUS.
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Join our mission to save the environment. We aim to promote environmental, social and economic benefit, all while prioritizing the environment over our product life cycles… from the initial manufacture using recycled materials until final disposal.
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube.
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Stopping Fatbergs from Forming in City Sewers
Fatbergs are quite literally a thing of nightmares. Stopping fatbergs is imperative.
Fatbergs are mounds of congealed cooking fats, oils and grease that collect items such as wet wipes and other non-flushable items that get sent into the sewer network, to form huge blockages that restrict the flow of raw sewage—thus, sending it back up into homes, neighborhoods, and the environment through sewer overflows. These blockages become hard as concrete and frequently need to be removed by hand. The sheer mention of fatbergs will send a chill down any sanitation worker’s spine.
“A fatberg smells like rotting meat mixed with the odor of a smelly toilet,” said said Alex Saunders, sewer network manager at Thames Water. (BBC)
Stopping Fatbergs Before They Form
In order to reduce the size and frequency of fatbergs in city sewer lines, we have to start at the source—kitchens. Both residential and commercial kitchens send copious amounts of cooking fats, oils and grease down the sink and into the sewer.
Think of it this way, if you send a pan of grease down the sink after making breakfast and your neighbors all do the same, individually you might not be sending a lot but together there is a great deal of grease making its way into your neighborhood sewer line. This grease coatings the inside of the sewer line, thus restricting the flow of raw sewage. Eventually the line, and your plumbing, will become completely clogged with a fatberg and you will have raw sewage spilling out into homes, the neighborhood and environment.
If we all make the conscious decision to stop rinsing cooking oil and grease, no matter how much, we can work at stopping fatbergs from forming.
@greasehero Never pour cooking oil and grease down the sink. Fatbergs cause sewer overflows into homes + environment. Grab a Grease Hero drain guard. 🌿 #greasehero #fatbergs #cookingathometiktoktv #cleaningtiktok #bacongrease #foryou
♬ Spooky, quiet, scary atmosphere piano songs – Skittlegirl Sound
Fatbergs Are Hard + Expensive to Remove
Fatbergs are hard to remove and it’s expensive too. Most fatbergs must be removed by hand since they are as hard as concrete. A special water jet is used to break the fatberg up into smaller pieces and then those pieces are removed from the pipe by manual excavation and powerful vacuumation tanker units.
Thames Water in London spends over £1m ($1.4 million) a month removing fatbergs from across their network.
New York City spends approximately $20 million annually to clear and repair damage from fatbergs. (Water & Wastes Digest)
Stopping Fatbergs with Grease Hero
One simple way to help stop fatbergs from forming is to properly dispose of your cooking fats, oils and grease after cooking a meal. Never rinse them down the kitchen sink drain. Another easy way to make an impact, is to be mindful of what you flush down the toilet.
Grease Hero is a convenient and hassle-free way of disposing of cooking fats, oils and grease after cooking a meal. The environmentally friendly drain guard is made of recycled materials and quickly absorbs the fats, oils and grease that you pour into it directly from your cooking pan. You then simply dispose of the entire drain guard into your trash or upcycle it at your city’s recycling facility. This keeps that harmful fats, oils and grease contaminants out of your plumbing, city sewers and prevents sewer overflows into the environment.
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Join our mission to save the environment. We aim to promote environmental, social and economic benefit, all while prioritizing the environment over our product life cycles… from the initial manufacture using recycled materials until final disposal.
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, LinkedIn and YouTube.
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Busting Grease Disposal Myths we See on TikTok
We recently had a grease disposal video go viral on TikTok, as of the writing of this blog post, it has amassed 595.5K views. (View it here.) While we were thrilled that so many people found the information we shared useful, the comments section quickly filled up with grease disposal myths that are prevalent but inaccurate. Below we examine two of the most pervasive myths we saw.
@greasehero Never rinse bacon grease down the drain. It quickly cools + congeals in your plumbing causing a blockage. Grab an eco friendly Grease Hero drain guard to quickly and easily dispose of it. 🌿 #greasehero #grease #bacongrease #cleaning #cleaningtiktok #fyp
Myth: Rinsing hot water and dish soap with the grease will keep it from clogging.
False. Pouring liquid soap down your drain will not push the rinsed cooking fats, oils and grease through your pipes. Sending hot water down after the soap is also not going to help. (That’s also wasting a lot of water.)
As soon as the grease enters your plumbing it begins to cool very quickly and solidify. This means that it starts hardening around the inside of your pipe, restricting the amount of water that can drain. Then rapidly collecting any additional food scraps that you send down the sink as well. With this mess happening in your plumbing, it does not take it very long to create a plumbing nightmare—a grease clogged pipe.
Any grease that makes it further down your line just means that it is clogging it in a place that is harder to fix and replace. This adds additional expenses to your plumbing bill. Grease will also make its way into city sewers and contribute to pipe busting fatbergs that send raw sewage spilling into neighborhoods, homes, businesses and the environment. The costs to repair these city lines are then sent back to you through water and sewage price increases.
However, the plumbing bills, clogged pipes and potential sewage back into your home can all be avoided by properly disposing of your cooking fats, oils and grease.
Save your water and soap, stop with this myth and instead dispose of the cooking oil and grease properly.
Myth: I rent, so proper grease disposal doesn’t matter.
False. Whether you rent or own your home, we all have a responsibility to protect the environment from sewage overflows. Renters can lose their deposit with clogged plumbing due to negligence and we doubt that you want your sinks backing up with dirty water, along with the possibility of sewage flowing back into your home ruining your belongings.
Proper grease disposal is important for everyone. If we want to pass on a healthy planet to the next generation, we need to work together to prevent pollution.
Grease Hero for Quick Grease Disposal
Grease Hero drain guards were developed to make disposing of cooking grease quick and easy. We understand that people don’t necessarily want to store this and therefore send it down the sink to get rid of it. With Grease Hero, you simply pour in the cooking fats, oils and grease directly from your pan into the eco friendly drain guard. You can then dispose of the drain guard in your trash or upcycle it at your city’s recycling facility.
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Join our mission to save the environment. We aim to promote environmental, social and economic benefit, all while prioritizing the environment over our product life cycles… from the initial manufacture using recycled materials until final disposal.
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, LinkedIn and YouTube.
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Grease Hero PLUS on Amazon
Grease Hero PLUS, our environmentally friendly fats, oil and grease storage system, is now available on Amazon.
When you purchase Grease Hero PLUS on Amazon you receive the drain guard system along with two Grease Hero drain guards.
What is Grease Hero PLUS?
Grease Hero PLUS is a self-contained storage system for our drain guards in which you can securely store your Grease Hero drain guard until it is ready to be tossed out with your trash or recycled. With a lid that tightly attaches to the base, you do not have to worry about any lingering odors in your kitchen. Grease Hero PLUS is made from recycled materials and is dishwasher safe.
Why is Grease Hero PLUS important?
Where it once made sense to pour your used cooking fats, oils and grease into an aluminum can or glass jar for disposal, today, those can be easily recycled or upcycled. Instead of filling these containers with cooking oil/grease, you can recycle them and opt for an eco friendly Grease Hero drain guard instead. Grease Hero PLUS and Grease Hero drain guards are both made with recycled materials because we are committed to a more sustainable future for our planet.
Each meal you cook may not have enough oil/grease to fill an entire Grease Hero drain guard. This is where Grease Hero PLUS comes in—easily store your drain guard until it is full and ready to be tossed out (or recycled at your nearest facility).
Our Commitment to the Environment
Our commitment to protecting the environment while educating consumers about responsible cooking fats, oils and grease disposal is as strong as ever. We understand the hidden dangers of clogged pipes in your home, fatbergs in sewer systems and the havoc sewer overflows have on local wildlife and our clean water supply. Our Grease Hero system is one simple way you can make a positive impact on the health of our planet.
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Join our mission to save the environment. We aim to promote environmental, social and economic benefit, all while prioritizing the environment over our product life cycles… from the initial manufacture using recycled materials until final disposal.
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, LinkedIn and YouTube.
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Grease Down the Sink Causes a Stink
Grease down the sink causes both a stink and major plumbing problem. Often, people rinse cooking grease down the sink because it’s still in liquid form and they just want to get rid of the unsightly mess. However, if you let that pan of grease sit out for an hour or more, you will find that it hardens into a pipe clogging substance.
When grease, in its liquid form, is rinsed down the sink, it quickly mixes with the cold water in your plumbing, hardens and builds up around the interior of your pipe. This reduces the diameter of the pipe, which means your sink drains slower. Once that buildup is there, it doesn’t take long for it to accumulate food scraps and other items rinsed down the sink—which causes a foul odor in your kitchen.
Finally, your pipe will become completely clogged and wastewater will begin to flow back into your sink and up through the drains in your home. If this sounds like a complete plumbing nightmare, we agree.
No Grease Down the Sink
This time of year, cities and municipalities ramp up their FOG (fats, oils and grease) campaigns to remind everyone of the dangers of rinsing turkey drippings, vegetable oil and other common holiday cooking ingredients down the sink. Hello, fatbergs. The large uptick in holiday cooking means that fatbergs grow at an alarming pace during the holiday season. These pipe busting fatbergs clog city sewer lines and send raw sewage spewing into roads, neighborhoods, and the environment.
We are here to remind you that while it is great to be mindful now, this is a plumbing and environmental contamination issue all year round. Recently, droughts, storm surges and freshwater contamination have been in the news. Water is a major topic because it is a commodity that needs to be taken care of considering there is a finite amount of it available. So, each time you make a responsible decision to properly dispose of that pan of bacon grease, those turkey drippings, or sauté cooking oil etc. you are benefiting our environment and water supply. If we all make this a priority, we can have a real impact on the health of our planet.
Grease Hero Drain Guards
Grease Hero is designed to be placed into the top of your kitchen sink drain, so you can quickly and easily pour the used cooking fats, oils and grease into it and then promptly dispose of the entire drain guard. It’s designed with recyclable materials to absorb the oil/grease waste and can be thrown out with your regular garbage or upcycled at your city’s recycling facility. See Grease Hero in action on our YouTube channel. This one easy change in your kitchen cleaning routine will save you money from costly plumbing repairs, the city from expensive sewer damage, and our environment from deadly contamination.
Don’t let grease down the sink cause a stink in your home and neighborhood.
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Join our mission to save the environment. We aim to promote environmental, social and economic benefit, all while prioritizing the environment over our product life cycles… from the initial manufacture using recycled materials until final disposal.
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, LinkedIn and YouTube.
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National Hardware Show | October 21-23, 2021
Our Grease Hero team will be at the National Hardware Show in Las Vegas this October. The show runs from October 21st to October 23rd. Find us at booth 4124.
About the National Hardware Show
The National Hardware Show is the top Hardware, Home Improvement, Lawn, Garden & Outdoor Living trade show in the country. Attendees will see thousands of exhibitors representing 15 major product categories, and a Show floor layout that will feature top products & exhibitors.
“Join us as we return for our 75th live edition with a renewed outlook on the future. Experience our first steps toward a fully reimagined show focused on celebrating innovation, deepening industry connections and growing our global footprint.”
About Grease Hero
Grease Hero has been developed and built out of a personal need—Shawn Santos, owner of multifamily rental units, had a recurring problem: plumbing pipes clogged with fats, oils and grease (FOG) that had been poured down drains; “I needed to educate tenants.” His father was a plumber and from a young age Shawn tagged along with him on his various plumbing calls, with this hands-on education he had extensive knowledge on the issues and dangers of grease-clogged pipes. “It can turn a 4-inch pipe into a 2-inch pipe.”He also knew that much of that oil ends up in Hawaii’s waterways and, eventually, the ocean.
Grease Hero drain guards were developed to help people properly dispose of cooking fats, oils and grease; however, protecting the environment has always been the mission. Clogs from cooking fats, oils and grease are dangerous for both people and animals. When these contaminants make their way into waterways, lakes, streams, fresh water supplies and the ocean through raw sewage overflows we are all at risk.
When sewage overflows contaminate public places and waters, people can be put at risk of exposure to the untreated sewage when drinking from a contaminated community water supply, eating contaminated fish or shellfish and swimming in contaminated open water.
Aside from health risks to humans – animals and ecosystems are also put in danger by sewage overflows. A key concern with sewage overflows that enter rivers, lakes, streams, or wetlands is their effect on water quality. The environmental impacts of sewage include hypoxia, harmful algal blooms, habitat degradation, floating debris, and impacts to threatened or endangered species. According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, more than 50% of threatened and endangered species are water-dependent.
“On one end we’re keeping oils out of the pipes and out of Hawaii’s water and upcycling them into biofuel, and on the front end we’re helping the environment by using recycled paper pulp. I started out just trying to find a solution personally for my units, and it turned into this.” (Building Management Magazine)
If you are also attending the National Hardware Show this year, stop by our booth and let’s connect.
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Join our mission to save the environment. We aim to promote environmental, social and economic benefit, all while prioritizing the environment over our product life cycles… from the initial manufacture using recycled materials until final disposal.
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube.
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Holiday Cooking Can Lead to Fatbergs
Whether it’s Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, or a normal weekend breakfast, avoid damaging your plumbing by never rinsing cooking fats, oil and grease down the sink. Holiday cooking can wreak havoc on your home’s plumbing, neighborhood sewer lines and the environment if there are sewer overflows due to fatbergs. The good news is that all these headaches and nightmare scenarios are completely avoidable with proper and responsible food disposal habits.
No Turkey or Ham Grease Down the Sink
From Business Insider: Thanksgiving means turkey dinners, family gatherings and football. For household drains and aging sewers across the United States, it means a lot of grease going down the pipes – and into the sewers.
For some harried cooks, the simplest way to get rid of fat from turkeys, bacon and roasts is down the kitchen drain. There it congeals, clogging the pipe and trapping food scraps until the only solution is to call the plumber.
“The day after Thanksgiving is the perfect storm for us,” said Paul Abrams, a spokesman for Roto Rooter, the biggest U.S. plumbing and drain cleaning service. “We have all hands on deck.” The number of calls to the company’s 7,000 plumbers and drain experts that day jumps 50 percent over a normal Friday. Calls go up by a fifth over the four-day Thanksgiving weekend, Abrams said.
Whether it is turkey drippings, vegetable oil or bacon grease they all need to be disposed of properly this Thanksgiving, and every day throughout the year. When you send a pan of oil or grease down your sink, it doesn’t take long for it to adhere to the sides of your plumbing and accumulate. The oil and grease congeal and lock in food scraps as well. This turns into a hard blockage (fatberg) that restricts the flow of wastewater. When wastewater has nowhere to go it comes back into your home causing major property and environmental damage.
Keep Dairy, Dressings and Food Scraps Out of Your Plumbing
Fats, oil and grease are found in a range of everyday foods. Salad dressing, melted butter, milk, sour cream, gravy, all of these items can lead to clogged plumbing in your home and horrible fatbergs in your neighborhood.
Here are some great tips from Florida Today on preventing FOG (fats, oils and grease) buildup in your plumbing:
- Never pour cooking oil, pan drippings, bacon grease, salad dressings or sauces down the sink or toilet or into street gutters or storm drains.
- Dispose of food scraps into the trash, not the sink.
- Don’t use a garbage disposal or food grinder. Grinding food up before rinsing it down the drain does not remove FOG; it just makes the pieces smaller.
- Place a catch basket or screen over the sink drain when rinsing dishware, or when peeling or trimming food, to catch small scraps that would otherwise be washed down the drain. Throw the scraps in the trash.
We are already seeing an uptick in fatbergs as we enter the fall and holiday cooking season. If we all take a moment to be mindful of our disposal habits and work on improving them, we can avoid fatbergs and sewer overflows in our own homes, neighborhoods, cities and environment.
Grease Hero Drain Guards Stop Fatbergs from Forming
Grease Hero is a convenient and hassle-free way of disposing of cooking fats, oils and grease after cooking a meal. The environmentally friendly drain guard is made of recycled materials and quickly absorbs the fats, oils and grease that you pour into it directly from your cooking pan. You then simply dispose of the entire drain guard into your trash or upcycle it at your city’s recycling facility.
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Join our mission to save the environment. We aim to promote environmental, social and economic benefit, all while prioritizing the environment over our product life cycles… from the initial manufacture using recycled materials until final disposal.
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube.
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Unblocktober 2021 Aims to Change Disposal Habits
Unblocktober 2021 starts October 1st! Since 2019, the month of October has been referred to as Unblocktober by many in the water treatment industry. Unblocktober is a month-long initiative started by Lanes for Drains, in which you consciously focus on what you pour down the sink (fats, oils and grease) and flush down the toilet. October is dedicated to paying attention to your current disposal habits and to find places where you can make a change that has a positive impact on the environment.
Protecting the ocean and global environment has always been our overarching goal and company mission. With that goal in mind, the Grease Hero drain guard was developed to help people properly dispose of cooking fats, oils and grease (FOG) after making a meal. By properly disposing of cooking fats, oils and grease instead of sending them down the sink, it prevents clogged pipes in your home, fatbergs in city sewers and sewage overflows into the environment.
Small changes in your disposal habits can make a big difference.
When sewers and drains become blocked, it can cause major issues, such as: Sewer flooding, pollution into the environment and local waterways along with major excavation, repairs and prolonged road work in your area. Improper disposal of household items can also lead to plastic pollution.
“Disposable face masks, nappies, period care products, cotton buds and many of the other items are non-biodegradable because they contain hidden plastics. Putting them in our drains increases the chances of plastic making its way into our rivers and seas – into which approximately 8 million pieces of plastic find their way every day.” (Unblocktober)
Unblocktober 2021 aims to reduce fatbergs.
From Unblocktober: We have spent decades consistently pouring dangerous liquids and items into our drains, leading to the creation of fatbergs – enormous masses of congealed fat, oil, grease, wet wipes, hygiene products, cotton buds, diapers, bandages and much more.
These huge fatbergs block drains and sewers, causing them to work less effectively than they should. The problem has gotten much worse since the COVID-19 pandemic, which saw many people’s recycling habits fall by the wayside.
Although 77% of the population know what a fatberg is and 64% say they are ‘very aware’ of what should and shouldn’t go down their drains, 48% willingly continue to put fatberg-forming substances into our sewers. (Data source: Lanes for Drains)
It’s time for change! This October (Unblocktober 2021), and beyond, let’s work on changing our current disposal habits and in turn protecting our environment for generations to come.
Grease Hero is proud to support Unblocktober’s mission to save our sewers and seas. We understand the environmental dangers of rinsing FOG down the kitchen sink and flushing items that shouldn’t be and applaud the Unblocktober team as they work to educate the public on these major global issues.
Want to get involved with Unblocktober? Sign up on the Unblocktober website.
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Join our mission to save the environment. We aim to promote environmental, social and economic benefit, all while prioritizing the environment over our product life cycles… from the initial manufacture using recycled materials until final disposal.
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube.
