Thieves Seek Restaurants’ Used Fryer Oil

[alp227]

Companies that collect used cooking grease from restaurants across the country have turned to all forms of sleuthing in recent years. Private investigators. Surveillance cameras. Rigged alarms. And still, containers full of used fryer oil are slipping through their fingers.

For years, restaurants had to pay companies to haul away the old grease, which was used mostly in animal feed. Some gave it away to local gearheads, who used it to make biodiesel for their converted car engines.

But with a demand for biofuel rising, fryer oil now trades on a booming commodities market, commanding around 40 cents per pound, about four times what it sold for 10 years ago. That makes it a tempting target for thieves, especially in hard times.

California and now Virginia have enacted special statutes to regulate grease collection from commercial kitchens; North Carolina legislators may vote on a similar law in May. But while some law enforcement agencies, especially in California, have become increasingly watchful about the problem, the courts have lagged behind.

full: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/us/restaurants-used-fryer-oil-attracting-thieves.html

the article also referenced an episode of "The Simpsons" from 1998, "Lard of the Dance", about Homer selling grease in a similar manner.

[Populist_Prole]

1. Several people I know run it ( legally obtained ) to mitigate 5 dollar/gallon diesel costs.

There's almost a cult status amongst them "the diesel mafia" I call them, and while I admire their resourcefulness, I gotta tell you the exhaust smell from their cars will knock a buzzard off a rotting corpse. Think of the emissions from a kitchen exhaust fan from the greasiest of greasy spoons, spread finer and more far-flung. That smell will get into the seats/interior of YOUR car if you are less than 2 tenths of a mile behind them. I'm retching just thinking about it.