How to Dispose of Cooking Oil

Frying bacon for breakfast, whipping up a stir-fry for dinner, or deep frying chips can leave you with leftover cooking oil. Normally the amount is fairly small compared to commercial kitchens, which means there are a few quick and convenient ways to dispose of used cooking oil at home:

• Reuse cooking oil – the greenest option is to reuse your cooking oil. This can be done once or twice, as cooking oil is reusable just it gets dirty so needs cleaning. Strain the old cooking oil through a coffee filter and keep in a secure container in a dark place until you need it.
• Solidify and dispose – you can freeze or refrigerate small amounts of used cooking oil, then throw it away with your household general waste.
• Combine with other materials – for faster disposal combine cooking oil with any cat litter, sawdust, or sand to soak it up before throwing away.
• Pour in with general waste – if you have a really small amount of waste cooking oil, you can pour it into your general waste bin. It’s best to put in a non-recyclable container, or soak it up with a paper towel or food scraps, to avoid it leaking out of a bin bag.
• Recycle cooking oil – check if your local household recycling centre accepts old cooking oil or if it can be placed in a food waste recycling bin (in a recyclable container).

Recycling cooking oil means it can be reused rather than ending up in a landfill. It also avoids contaminating other waste streams and blocking pipes when disposed of improperly. You can add very small amounts of cooking oil to your food waste recycling services though. For larger volumes, recycling cooking oil should be done separately.

Most cooking oil is recycled to create fuel alternatives or be used as animal feed. Some recycled cooking oil is repurposed into cleaning materials and other household products, such as soaps, shampoo, moisturisers, and lamp oil. Cooking oil recycling puts such waste material to much better use than going to a landfill site.

Recycling cooking oil is important as it saves on the energy and resources required to create new cooking oil. Like most oils, it doesn’t become useless once you’ve cooked with it – just dirty – so reusing or recycling used cooking oil is the best option. Plus, it prevents drains and sewers becoming blocked due to improper cooking oil disposal.

Used cooking oil recycling can convert it into biofuels for heating, power generation, and to fuel vehicles. These biofuels generally burn clean and produce zero carbon monoxide. Cooking oil recycling also reduces any risks of contaminating the environment by diverting it away from landfill, where it poses a fire risk and adds to pollution levels.

One of the main ways cooking oil is recycled is by converting it into a biofuel such as biodiesel. After removing waste cooking oil from your business or household it will be transported to a specialist oil recycling centre. Here the general process for recycling cooking oil is as follows:

• Used cooking oil is assessed and graded for quality by inspecting its colour and clarity. This helps define how long the recycling process may take.
• Food and solid waste are removed as the cooking oil is sieved and cleaned in a tank. The oil is normally heated at the same time to separate small debris and impurities, which settle at the bottom and are removed.
• The cleaned oil is filtered until it meets the requirements of biofuel refineries.
• Once the cooking oil meets the required standards, it’s sent to a dedicated biodiesel refinery for the transesterification process, which converts it into biodiesel.
• This recycled biodiesel is then used in relevant vehicles, for heating, and to power electricity generators.