What happens if you pour grease down the drain?

Everyone seems to be in the kitchen making Insta-worthy meals to share with friends and family. But cooking can be a bit messy. We all know that you shouldn’t pour hot grease down the drain as it will clog the drain and corrode your pipes. But the effects are much, much worse.

Tech Insider takes us into a sewer where fat, once mixed with everyone else’s discarded fat, forms huge clumps, sometimes called “fatbergs,” that can reach enormous sizes (a 17-ton fatberg was once found in a British sewer found) and completely block the sewage system. And cleaning can take weeks.

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Next time you want to get rid of excess fat, let it solidify and throw it in the trash. Soak up any remaining fat with a paper towel. Now look at this and try not to gag.

It’s a common misconception that it’s okay to pour grease down the drain when you run hot water and add dish soap. In fact, grease should never go down the drain. Even if it’s hot and easy to pour out of the pan, it will eventually cool down and solidify somewhere in your pipes. This causes a rubbery mass to form along the pipe walls, trapping other debris that flows down the drain. Over time, the resulting clogs could cause your drains to stop.

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Even if the grease makes its way through your home’s plumbing system, it continues to wreak havoc on the municipal sewer system. Some cities spend millions of dollars each year rehabilitating damaged sewage systems and removing masses of solid waste – obstacles the industry calls “fatbergs,” named for the cooking oil and grease that holds the obstacles together. By never pouring grease down the drain, you can prevent clogs and other problems further down the line.

A convenient and clean way to dispose of cooking fat is to pour it into an empty jar, can, or other container. Screw the lid onto the jar or wait for the fat in the jar to cool and harden. Then throw it in the trash.

You can also wait for the fat to solidify in the pan and then wipe it out with paper towels, which you should then throw away. To prevent your garbage can from smelling, empty it shortly after disposing of the oil or grease.