WARREN - The City Council Energy Committee is discussing getting fuel from fried food.
They discussed a company in Alabama - Biodiesel Logic - that claims it can turn waste vegetable oil from restaurants into biodiesel fuel at a cost of about 60 to 90 cents a gallon.
A nearby town, Hoover, Ala., uses this fuel to power its truck fleet, according to the city Web site and cable news reports.
Councilman Dan Crouse, I-at large, stressed that the discussion Tuesday was preliminary. No plans have been finalized and no deals have been made, but the idea was discussed as one possibility to cut down on the cost of the 80,000 gallons of diesel fuel the city burns through in one year. He used the recent dip in gas prices as an example of the need to find ways to save.
"This $1.68 (per gallon) was a short bit of fun. We're going to be back in energy hell in a little bit," Crouse said.
The source oil could be collected from Warren restaurants, which either have to pay to have their fryer oil taken away or sell theirs to another company.
Sunrise Inn owner Ken Haidaris sells his into what he believes to be a similar operation to Biodiesel Logic. He said there was a demand for his fry grease as a fuel.
"I have farmers coming in all the time trying to buy it, but I'm already contracted out," he said.
Haidaris thought a citywide biodiesel program could work, though.
City leaders in Hoover claims it works there. The city collects oil from restaurants and residents to put into its biodiesel facility. The city then uses the fuel to power its truck fleet and equipment. The city's mayor was quoted in a report by Fox News stating that the trucks in Hoover smell like french fries.
Crouse said the fuel sometimes picks up the odor of whatever was cooking in it prior to it becoming biodiesel.
Hoover's Web site announced in 2007 that it won an international award for environmental sustainability from LivCom, which is an organization that recognizes "livable communities."
A company spokesman did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment Wednesday, but Biodiesel Logic's Web site lists rate plans to either lease or buy the equipment. The rate plan lists prices ranging from $10,000 to $100,000.
The city could plumb the murky depths even further than Hoover if tests to a sample of oil from the water treatment plant come up in its favor. The city is sitting on a few thousand gallons of waste vegetable oil that gets skimmed off the top of settling tanks and treated along with everything else at the plant. Crouse said it would be premature to assume that it would work, but in an ideal scenario he hopes this excess material can be turned into tan gold.
The oil and grease is not really welcome at the treatment plant. Workers there say its a hassle to clean up and plant managers say they often will not accept waste oil to disposal. That has not stopped the plant from being on the receiving end of cooking oil which can fill a 20,000 gallon holding tank there.
"The oil ends up in the water when they dump it down the sink - which we encourage people not to do,'' wastewater plant manager Tom Angelo said. ''There's veggie oil in the system every day."
Could that free source material be turned into fuel? People at the committee weren't positive that it could, but they said it could be tested. Angelo sent a sample of the oil to Precision Analytical laboratory Wednesday morning to look at its value in British thermal units, its flashpoint and whether it leaves behind any harmful byproducts.
Crouse said he would ask people at Biodiesel Logic if the material would work in the system. There's also a question of any odor that type of biodiesel would create.
He also announced that the city administration has sent a letter of interest to another company that could heat sewage sludge and use the gas that comes off of it to create electricity. The city would need to create a request for proposals before contracting with any company offering to do this first.
The committee also is looking at combining city departments into fewer buildings to save on heating costs.
