The true cost of recycling
Let me introduce you to WEEE. This rather unfortunate acronym stands for the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment directive, forthcoming legislation from Brussels that aims to minimise the impact on the environment of catering equipment when it reaches the end of its working life. The directive will make suppliers of catering equipment responsible for financing the recycling and environmentally friendly disposal of everything from microwave ovens to six-burner cooking ranges.
This new piece of legislation comes into effect this August, and its impact could be to crank up the cost of every piece of catering equipment.
The exact working of the directive is not finalised, so it is not clear whether it will be the shop that sells the original oven to the chef that will be responsible for its recycling, or the shop that supplies the replacement. What is very clear is that, in a world of very tight profit margins for suppliers, the cost will be passed on in some form to caterers, either as a direct cost or as a reduction to any discount.
The first pinch from the EU's environmentally friendly recycling policy was felt two years ago, with the directive on the safe disposal of insulating foam and refrigerants from fridges. That put an additional replacement cost on a fridge that now varies from a modest £10 for a small cabinet to more than £100 for a big coldroom installation. This is a significant cost for a small independent hotel or restaurant, but it's a huge hike in equipment cost for a chain operator.
CESA, the Catering Equipment Suppliers Association, has lobbied hard to get catering equipment excluded from the WEEE directive on the grounds that catering equipment has such a high metal content that it doesn't need legislation to send it for recycling - common sense sends it to the scrap metal merchant. CESA director Keith Warren says the organisation has successfully lobbied the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), the body responsible for implementing the EU directive in the UK, not to make the legislation retrospective. This means that equipment bought prior to WEEE implementation day on 15 August will be exempt from the recycling levy.
As with so much EU legislation, the top line is simple, but the devil is in the detail. Warren says that the cost of recycling will be written into purchasing contracts after August, but the cost is probably going to be buried in the price bargaining that accompanies the purchase of every item of kitchen equipment, from a simple stick blender to an island suite.
| ### The fat trap Dumping waste cooking oil down the drain is something that nobody admits to, but lots of caterers do. Basically, it's cheaper than paying for cooking oil recycling. While dumping waste cooking oil into the public sewer is widely condemned, dumping greasy water down the drain is seen as a lesser crime. Thousands of dishwashers discharge tons of grease into sewers every day, and nowhere is the problem worse than in central London. With a high density of restaurants and fast-food outlets in the middle of the city, the build-up of fat is sending the vermin population to record levels. Thames Water Authority says it has to deal with as many as 100,000 blocked drains a year, at a cost of £6m, and it estimates that half of these blockages are caused by the illegal dumping of waste cooking oil into the sewerage system by pubs, restaurants and fast-food take-aways. If a blocked drain can be proved to be the result of a fat discharge from a particular restaurant, Thames Water will charge the cost of clearance to the restaurant, as will every other water authority. Dumping grease will also lead to clogging of the drains in the surrounding area, which requires expensive professional clearance. Thames Water is now so concerned about the problem that it is calling for all commercial kitchens to be fitted with grease traps. Kitchen designers will always recommend the fitting of a grease trap as common sense but, with an entry price of £2,000, they are not cheap. A grease trap works by slowing down the flow of warm or hot greasy water and allowing it to cool. As it cools, the grease and oil separate and float to the top of the grease trap. The cooler water, containing less grease, continues to flow down the pipe into the sewer while the grease is trapped by baffles which cover the inlet and outlet of the tank, preventing grease from flowing out of the trap. The baffles are regularly removed for cleaning and the grease is put into general waste for landfill. Different local authorities have differing views on the siting of a grease trap. Some say it must be outside the kitchen, others are happy for it to be in the kitchen. But where a grease trap is taking water from a dishwashing system, it must be sited sufficiently far away from the dishwasher to allow the emulsified fat to cool and separate from the water. For this reason alone, the specifying and installation of a grease trap is a specialised service. Some local authorities will not allow food waste that has been pulverised in an under-sink waste disposal unit to be discharged into the sewers, and the normal way of complying with this regulation is through a dewatering system. This simply separates water from suspended solids, with the water going into the drains and the slurry being disposed of through landfill. |
| ### Chilled waste One aspect of waste disposal that troubles every catering business is the sight and smell of food waste bins. They can be screened off with wooden panels, but midsummer smells hold no respect for interwoven fencing. In addition to the smell, there's the very real threat of a vermin problem. At the Hoste Arms hotel in the Norfolk village of Burnham Market, owner Paul Whittome has invested in a coldroom from Williams Refrigeration to manage its food waste between collection times, replacing the practice of having the waste bins held in the car park. The wheelie waste bins are held at 8¼C, and this enclosed and temperature-controlled environment solves all three food waste management problems: the guests are spared the sight and smell, vermin are kept out, and bacterial growth is contained. Whittome has no doubts that chilled storage for food waste is not a luxury, but a sound investment. "All hotels should consider a temperature-controlled waste-holding area," he says. "Bins are unsightly and smelly. For us, it was difficult to hide six large bins in the car park area, and it was made worse by outside seating being nearby." |
| ### Contacts Equipment disposal and grease traps CESA 020 7233 7724 Dewatering units IMC 01923 718000 Refrigerated waste storage systems Williams Refrigeration 01553 817000 |
