Many home cooks use cooking oil on a daily basis, which means that they will inevitably have to discard the oil at some point in time. If you’re wondering how to properly dispose of cooking grease and oils, this article has the answers for you!

5 Ways To Dispose of Used Cooking Oil and Grease

Here is a short list of 5 simple ways that you can get rid of that cooking oil that you used to fry those potatoes or cook that turkey in!

Discard It In A Decomposable Container

Once the oil / grease has cooled off you can pour it into a paper or cardboard container and then simply throw it away. Used milk cartons are an excellent container to use.

Add It To Your Compost Bin

Add a little bit of leftover cooking oil to your compost bin as it can make the decomposition process much easier. But be careful not to add too much. (1 cup should be fine). The types of cooking oils that you can add to your compost bin are…

  • vegetable
  • corn
  • olive
  • sunflower
  • rapeseed

Avoid all other types of used cooking oils.

The reason you don’t want to add too much oil / grease into your compost bin is because it can slow down the amount of time it takes for the contents to decompose.

Bring It To A Bio-Diesel Plant

If you run a restaurant you may end up with quite a bit of used cooking oil and grease. So, if there’s an oil recycling center in your area, this is the best way for you to dispose of cooking oils and grease because they will recycle them.

Use A Grease Disposal System

Many restaurants have a grease disposal system that will take in all of the cooking oil and grease so you don’t have to worry about it.

Save Oil and Grease For Arts and Crafts

A creative way to re-use cooking oil is to make soap out of it. This is a fun and crafty way to make use of your used cooking oil!

You can also re-use cooking oil to grease gardening tools, to remove pollen, bugs, grime and dirt from many surfaces and it can even help to remove paint from your hands. There are many ways that you can creatively re-use cooking oil. Check out the website at Mahoneys.com for more ideas.

Make Your Own Insecticide

You can use cooking oil as an eco-friendly alternative to keep bugs away. A mixture of the oil or grease and liquid soap is more effective than just using one or the other, since it suffocates harmful insects with its oily coating that blocks their pores they need for breathing – ironically making them easier targets!

Just mix 1 cup of grease with 1 tablespoon of liquid soap in a container. This will be your “supply” to use when you need it.

When you’re ready to use it just pour 1 quart of water into a spray bottle and add 2 teaspoons of your “supply” into the bottle and start spraying.

BONUS: You can also use this recipe to kill unwanted grass and weeds.

Mix It With Other Solid Waste Products

You can mix your leftover cooking oil and grease with things like cat litter, flour, sand, etc. and then discard the whole lot.

The Wrong Way To Dispose of Cooking Oil and Grease

You never want to pour grease or oil down your drain or garbage disposal.

You might think that grease is liquid and can go down the drain, but you would be wrong. Sometimes fat cools off in your sink and doesn’t stay a liquid anymore – this is when it can become dangerous for garbage disposals because they really just don’t want to handle anything other than liquids!

Disposing of oil and grease can be a messy business. It’s important to know the best way to dispose of used cooking oils, as they can clog up your drains or end up in other places you don’t want them if not disposed properly.

If you have any questions about plumbing maintenance or are having some problems with it, call Atlantis Plumbing today at 770-443-8229. We are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.