(Ecns.cn) -- News that Dutch airline KLM plans to power Boeing 737 flights with cooking oil kindled a light of hope for many bio-energy companies in June. Yet, Chinese bio-energy companies are still facing difficulties with resource shortages as "gutter oil" continues to flow back to restaurants.
Recycled, or used, cooking oil is a resource for bio-fuels. The so-called "gutter oil" is a type of used cooking oil that can be described as a "foul slop fished up from sewage drains or collected at restaurant back doors." While this kind of used oil is helping airplanes soar into the sky abroad, it is in high demand, even though it is often illegal, as edible food oil for domestic restaurants. The irregular distribution of this resource is causing troubles for bio-energy companies in China.
Used cooking oil, a vital resource in shortage
Once a week Master Cui visits Taifeng Restaurant to collect used cooking oil for the bio-energy company that he works at in Beijing. Upon his arrival, he enters the restaurant’s kitchen and skillfully opens a stainless steel container by the side of the kitchen range, which he refers to as the oil-water separator. The overused oil mixed with food residue from the kitchen is kept inside of it to undergo a layering process. He says when the oil is on top of the sewage water, the bottom part can drain away.
Cui takes out a white plastic drum. Then he plugs the pipe of an electric pump into the container to lead the oil into the drum. According to Cui, he has many colleagues who are doing similar work. There is even a night team in his company, specially arranged for chain restaurants such as the McDonald's in Beijing. The team members collect used cooking oil every night, and then send it to Gu'an, in Hebei Province, where the bio-fuel is produced.
According to Li Dong, Chairman of the Board of a bio-energy company, the so-called "gutter oil" is often referred to in a broad sense, but it simply means used cooking oil. It can be divided into three categories: one is the gutter oil fished up from sewage drains or oil made from swill; another is oil extracted from inferior pork, pig organs, or pigskin; and the other is overused oil that has been fried many times and contains food residues.
In theory, the first two categories of gutter oil cannot be processed for restaurants to use because the cost is too high. The overused frying oil meets the standards for reprocessing and then flows back to restaurants. However, many enterprises are flouting social morality and producing illegal cooking oil of the first two categories.
Li revealed that with the development of the catering industry, at least 150 tons of gutter oil is produced in Shanghai every day. Among the 150 tons, only one third can be processed scientifically and hygienically, but the other two thirds still flow back to restaurants.
It has been reported that some low-end restaurants have established stable buy-and-sell relationships with underground oil recyclers. As the light-colored overused oil is usually sold to the small enterprises, and most bio-energy companies can only get dark-colored gutter oil, these companies are having a hard time due to lack of resources.
