It's a seasonal spin on "going green." Thanksgiving is over, and there's likely plenty of cooking oil and grease left over. A dozen Colorado cities want to recycle it.
This is the unsavory side of Thanksgiving leftovers. Dave Stacy, a volunteer says, "It's nasty, it's nasty, I've worked in the utilities division for three years, this is just as ugly as that."
Stacy volunteered his Saturday to help collect turkey grease and other cooking oil. It's part of a recycling event called Holiday Recyc-oil where people can drive up and drop off their used grease. Some came with quite a collection of cooking oil.
One participant says, "About seven years worth."
"Today I brought down a little under twenty gallons,” another participant said.
It made for some interesting conversation at the deposit barrel. One contributor says "So is this just this year's or have you had this around the house for sometime?" "This is just from Thursday you know," said another.
After going into this container, they'll then head off to a processing facility and eventually the grease you see here will be turned into fuel, biodiesel fuel to be exact. The goal of Recyc-oil is to divert used cooking oil from municipal water systems and landfills.
Cooking grease and oil are some of the main culprits for clogging up water systems and pipes...so proper recycling and disposal can help cities save money and manage messy back ups or spills. But for most people, they're just glad to get that grease off their hands.
"It was on the side of my house for the better part of two years," said one recycler.
This is the second year Rocky Mountain Sustainable Enterprises has partnered with cities for the event.
Last year, nearly two-thousand gallons of cooking oil were recycled.