Cooking oil can power homes - 28 August 2009

COOKING oil could soon supply the power to run your oven.

A new recycling scheme signed up to by Kent County Council will turn used cooking oil into electricity.

Collection banks for oil will be installed in Maidstone and 15 other Kent towns as part of a bid to reduce the county's dependence on fossil fuels.

Each collection tank can hold 1,000 litres, enough to power an average UK home for a year.

Disposing of used oil had cost companies about £15 million a year nationally, but now it can be turned into a fuel, called LF100, to power generators.

One litre of cooking oil can power a dishwasher for three hours, make 240 cups of tea or power an energy-saving light bulb for 225 hours.

The recycling scheme is run by the Living Fuels company at no cost to tax payers.

It filters the oil and then feeds it into a generator in East Anglia, which is used to supply power to nearby businesses. There are long-term plans
to build a generator in Kent.

The containers will be at waste management sites including Tovil tip in Burial Ground Lane, Maidstone, as well as Gravesham and Dartford, Faversham, Deal, Sheerness, Margate, Sandwich, Herne Bay, Canterbury, Dover, Ashford, Folkestone, Sittingbourne and Tunbridge Wells.