Grease Trap Guide for restaurant operators in N. Ireland. Catering Waste responsibilities and waste water discharge requirements for restaurants caterwaste, fat, oil, grease and waste food.

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Cater Waste Guide 2013
Straining - Screening - Separating
Catering Waste Water Guide
Catering food waste generally contains
putrescible animal by-products such as raw,
cooked or processed meat, fish, dairy or bakery
products.
This is classified as a controlled waste which all
producers have a legal duty of care to control
and dispose of without harming the environment.
1.7 million tonne of commercial food waste is produced in the UK every year
and it is estimated that 0.5 million
tonne of this is disposed into the
drainage network system.
Fat, oil and grease (FOGc)
constitute 13% of this wasted food
and directly contribute to 150,000
sewer blockages throughout the UK
every year.

2.
Cater Waste Guide 2013
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Catering Waste Authorisation
The Environmental Protection Act 1990
requires that producers of controlled waste take all
reasonable precautions to avoid knowingly
causing or
permitting
controlled waste
to be disposed
without
authorisation
Commercial kitchen sinks and wash-ware
equipment must discharge into the
drainage system through preventative
straining, screening or separating
devices to ensure that there are no
avoidable releases of contaminant
particulates.
Catering waste producers must check and keep proof that anyone they pass their
waste to is authorised to take it, so as not to be held liable if it is found that
their waste is disposed of illegally by methods such as fly-tipping or
dumping into a drainage system without permission.

3.
Cater Waste Guide 2013
Straining - Screening - Separating
Catering Waste Water Compliance
All discharges to drain require authorisation by a sewerage undertaker.
The waste producer must receive written permission from either the mains
foul sewerage provider (public) or from the local environmental authority
subject to conditions being met by a
treatment system (private).
Catering operators’ duty of care
requires reasonable precautionary
measures to be implemented to
reduce and remove catering waste
food, fat, oil and grease.
These measures should be visible to
allow easy verification and inspection,
and should include simple straining
and screening devices, which are
practical and conform to guidelines issued
by the appropriate regulatory authority.

4.
Cater Waste Guide 2013
Straining - Screening - Separating
Suppliers of modern, predominantly cooking appliances which have a
cleaning outlet for disposal, can advise the user which preventative
measures they adopt to ensure compliance with their duty of care
Regulatory authorities may adopt the practical approach recommended by
the Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG) which aims
to “determine tolerable quantities” of fats, oils and greases which do not
cause problems of clogging or treatment in drains and sewers.
Catering Waste Water Regulations
The Waste Minimisation Act 1998
allows the waste collection or
disposal authority to take whatever
action it deems necessary to
expedite the
minimisation of
any type of
controlled
waste.
Regulators may
consider pre-treatment technologies’ suitability at point of
source inline with practical cost and space limitations;
including any overlap between governing departments or
conflicting standards involving multiple input parameters
and variable working conditions.
Good standard guidelines are preferably concerned with setting practical and
achievable conditions such as factory-set pre-measured, controlled flow rates
and space constraint considerations as opposed to hypothetical and generally
unenforceable zero-tolerance criteria, which often prove counter productive.
The UK Water Acts confer rights to make general provisions to protect the
sewerage system; which apply to all discharges to sewer, irrespective of
whether or not they are considered to be trade effluent. This includes
conditions such as: “an effluent pre-treatment plant may have to be

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Cater Waste Guide 2013
Straining - Screening - Separating
installed and maintained in order to remove or reduce certain constituents in
the trade effluent…”
The maximum penalty upon prosecution for illegally disposing of waste is a
fine of £50,000 and up to 12 months imprisonment in the Magistrates Court
or 5 years imprisonment and unlimited fine at the Crown Court.
Waste Water Food Recovery
The European standard EN1825-2:4 requires that commercial kitchen
applications discharging catering waste water shall install straining or
screening devices on the upstream, inlet side of a non-sludge retaining
gravity grease separator.
The straining or screening devices should be cleaned out on a daily basis
to prevent putrefaction and should be installed in readily accessible locations
(under-sink or combi-oven) to allow
simple collection and removal.
All internal straining, screening and
separating waste food, fat, oil and
grease devices should be completely
sealed and odour tight according to
EN12056 during normal operation.
Straining baskets should have complete
access and clearance for easy and
hygienic removal.

6.
Cater Waste Guide 2013
Straining - Screening - Separating
In circumstances where food, fat, oil or grease waste is to be recovered; for
use in controlled animal pet food, the discharging outlet point of delivery to
the drainage system should be clearly identified. Most discharge levels
exceeding 150mm from ground and head height of 300mm can now readily
be strained and captured for recovery.
It is estimated that an average inadvertent discharge of typical catering
food waste, which exceeds 1kg/m3 water is likely to result in an excess of
100mg/l fat, oil and grease within the trade effluent.
Waste Water Grease Recovery
Kitchen plan layouts are ideally designed so that the identified prime
contaminating drainage discharging equipment and appliances are
grouped to allow optimum plumbing for contaminant containment.
Approximately 95% of UK commercial catering
establishments discharge their wastewater into
the public mains drainage system. For
plumbing installations in space constrained
urban drainage layouts, it may only be possible
to achieve partial compliance with EN1825-1
and EN1825-2 standard and building regulators
may provide an allowance for this.
It is estimated that less than 5% of existing

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Cater Waste Guide 2013
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public draining UK commercial catering premises neither have nor could
readily install a grease separator into their plumbing or drainage system that
would be fully compliant with EN1825-1 and EN1825-2 standards for
gravity grease separators.
Waste food, fat, oil & grease recovery effluent pre-treatment units and
supplementary technologies may be used in sequence and in accordance
with Directive 96/61/EC and Directive 2008/1/EC, which require that
pollution should be prevented at source by using BAT (Best Available
Technology).
Gravity assisted devices, which utilize forces additional to gravity and fall
outside of the scope of EN1825-1 and EN1825-2; should be installed which
positively contribute towards resource management.
Catering Waste Water
The waste water footprint for wasted food in the UK is 280 litres per
person per day; which is nearly twice the average daily UK household
water use. Wet waste disposal units or macerators which are still used in
households (who currently fall outside the scope of controlled waste),
continue to contribute toward the waste food/water footprint.

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Cater Waste Guide 2013
Straining - Screening - Separating
The UK alone wastes 6.2 billion cubic metres of water through food waste
disposal every year. Global resources face a major challenge producing food for
over 7 billion people on the planet and cannot afford to allow such huge
quantities of water to simply go down the drain alongside this food waste.
Commercial catering premises should actively seek to reduce their waste food/
water footprint by scraping and dry wiping plates and using sinks and wash-
ware appliances responsibly with straining, screening and separating
devices.
Unneccessary use of very hot water also results in waste water temperatures
exceeding 43°C adding to a compounding waste of useful energy resource
whereas the minimum waste water temperature of 31°C is generally all that
is required in order to ensure decongealment of grease to allow capture and
recovery. Thermostats should be adjusted accordingly.
Supplementary pre-treatment waste water solutions can be used on filtered,
stable; emulsified waste water discharge to help prevent de-emulsification or
grease congealment in the down-steam pipework. The wastewater total life cycle
can only be complete once the critical drainage transport link from point of
discharge to treatment remains uninterrupted from blockage restrictions.
Cater Waste Guide
This guide is designed to assist catering establishments
achieve compliance with relevant legislation. However, it
is not a replacement for legislation and compliance with
this guide does not automatically guarantee compliance
with all relevant legislation.
It is the responsibility of the architect, developer,
property owner and operator to be familiar with and act in
accordance with all prevailing legal requirements.

9.
Cater Waste Guide 2013
Straining - Screening - Separating
This guide may be used in the absence of specific local authority guidance
from whom it is recommended that a record requesting specific guidance is
sought and kept in accordance with CDM2007 and that any specific
conditions required are notified to all waste water discharging equipment
suppliers at the time of specification.
Whilst every care has been taken in the preparation of this document, no
liability can be accepted for any counsel or for any error or omission.
Examples and equipment references are for illustrative purposes only and it
remains the responsibility of the applicant to ensure that selected equipment
and waste management plans meet the requisite standards.
As a general Catering Waste guide, it is estimated that an average
inadvertent discharge of typical catering food waste, which exceeds
1kg/m3 wastewater is likely to result in the trade effluent breaching the
nominal hydrocarbon limit of 100mg/l.
Waste food/water drain allowance :-
+ 2.0 Kg / m3
®
1-2 Kg / m3
- 1.0 Kg / m3
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