Every October, Unblocktober puts the spotlight on what we put down our drains, encouraging homes and businesses to think more carefully about the everyday actions that can contribute to blockages and pollution. For those of us working in commercial grease management, it also highlights a particular challenge: how do commercial kitchens prevent the fats, oils and grease they produce every day from entering the drainage system?
The advice not to pour cooking oil or grease directly down a drain is straightforward enough, but commercial kitchens present a more complicated problem. FOG isn’t only produced when somebody empties a pan or fryer. Cooking, food preparation, washing dishes and cleaning equipment all create wastewater that can contain fats, oils, grease and food solids. Once that wastewater leaves the sink, those contaminants need to be effectively managed before they travel further into the drainage system.
Grease doesn’t simply disappear once it is out of sight. FOG entering drainage pipework can accumulate over time, restricting flow and contributing to blockages. By the time the problem becomes obvious, the grease may already have travelled well beyond the point at which it originally entered the system. Clearing the resulting blockage addresses the immediate problem, but preventing it means looking further upstream.
Managing FOG at the Source
This is where effective grease management becomes particularly important. The objective shouldn’t simply be to deal with grease somewhere within the drainage system. Where possible, fats, oils and grease should be separated and removed from commercial kitchen wastewater close to the point at which they are produced.
GreaseShield® was developed around this principle. Contaminated wastewater enters the system, where food solids are separated and fats, oils and grease are separated from the wastewater stream. The separated FOG is then automatically removed from the unit and transferred into an external collection container for disposal. Rather than relying solely on storing accumulated grease within the system until a periodic clean-out, GreaseShield® actively removes separated FOG during operation.
Effective grease management, however, is about more than the technology inside the unit. Commercial kitchens vary enormously, from small cafés and restaurants to hotels, hospitals and large-scale catering operations. The appliances connected to the drainage system, the number of contamination points, wastewater flow rates, operating hours and the type of food being prepared can all affect the demands placed on grease management equipment.
Correct specification therefore matters. Understanding where contaminated wastewater is being produced and how much wastewater the system needs to handle allows an appropriate GreaseShield® model to be selected for the application. This applies whether grease management is being considered during the design of a new commercial kitchen or retrofitted into an existing operation.
From Reacting to Preventing
Unblocktober is largely about prevention, and that principle is just as relevant in a commercial kitchen. A blocked drain is an obvious problem because it demands attention. Effective grease management should be happening long before that point is reached.
Looking at grease management in this way also changes the questions businesses should be asking. Rather than simply considering whether grease management equipment is present, it is worth understanding what happens to the FOG it encounters. How is the grease separated from the wastewater? What happens to it afterwards? How is it removed from the system? What maintenance is required? And has the equipment been correctly specified for the wastewater the kitchen actually produces?
These questions shift the focus away from responding to drainage problems after they occur and towards preventing them at source.
Unblocktober may only run for one month, but effective grease management is a year-round requirement for commercial kitchens. Preventing FOG-related problems means addressing them before they develop, with correctly specified equipment that separates and removes fats, oils and grease from wastewater at source. GreaseShield® is designed to do exactly that, helping commercial kitchens take a preventative approach to grease management rather than waiting for problems to appear further down the drainage system.
