On Nov. 25, when leftovers line fridge shelves and stuffing recipes slip back into kitchen drawers, Thanksgiving feasters will have the opportunity to get rid of their waste cooking grease and help the environment in the process.
During the 7th Annual Day-After-Thanksgiving Grease Drive, Tucson-based company Grecycle Arizona, LLC will collect used grease with several drop off points across Tucson.
Grecycle was founded by Mike Kazz, who graduated in 1992 from the UA's agricultural and biosystems engineering department, a joint program between the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and the College of Engineering. Since then, Kazz has hired two more UA graduates: Burch, who is an associate chemical engineer and Grecycle's advertising lead, and Walter Diaz, an engineer who came to the UA from his native Mexico to obtain a master's degree in agricultural and biosystems engineering in 2007.
"Biodiesel is fuel that can be used today, not at some distant point in the future," said Mark Riley, professor and department head of agricultural and biosystems engineering. "The conversion of waste cooking oil to biodiesel is a relatively straightforward and mild chemical process, and we have a pretty good grip on how to do it safely and efficiently."
Riley's department has partnered with Grecycle on constructing a pilot plant at the UA's Campus Agricultural Center, or CAC, located at Campbell Avenue and Roger Road in Tucson, to convert waste cooking oil from the University's student unions into biodiesel to power vehicles of the UA's fleet.