Fat, Oils and Grease

Fats, Oils, and Grease (FOG) dumped down your drain will congeal and block pipes, causing nasty sewer backups into your home and the street. Avoid a huge mess, expensive plumber bill, and contamination of our environment and water supplies by properly disposing of your household FOG.

How to Dispose of Grease and Cooking Oil

• Scrape food, oil, grease and sauces from plates into the trash.
• Use a jar, coffee can, or other container to hold larger amounts of grease before placing in trash.
• Do not use hot water and soap to wash grease down the drain because it will harden in your pipes or in the sewer system.  
• Recycle used cooking oil at Mesa's Household Hazardous Materials facility.   

Wipes and Personal Items - Don't flush! When in doubt, toss it out (in a trash can).

“Flushable” wipes: These wipes are not flushable and don’t break down in the sewer system the same way toilet paper does. Toilet paper breaks down anywhere from a minute to four minutes, wipes take at least six hours to disintegrate, if at all. Pumps that move sewage to treatment plants cannot break wipes down and the pumps get clogged.

Dental floss: Made of nylon or Teflon, dental floss wraps around sewer system equipment and can accumulate into a huge wad when combined with other debris. It’s really strong!

Contact lenses: Not easily biodegradable, lenses aren’t affected by the bacteria that breaks down biological waste at treatment plants.

Personal hygiene products: Made of absorbent material that does not break down easily, personal hygiene products can clog sewer systems and cannot be processed by wastewater treatment plants.

Medications: Treatment plants are not designed to filter out pharmaceuticals. Medications that are disposed in the toilet or sink can end up entering our drinking water supply through streams, rivers and lakes. Read more about proper medication disposal. 

Kitty litter: We love our kitties, but their litter does not dissolve in water and can create clogs even if the package says “flushable.” Kitty litter is an absorptive substance designed to expand thousands of times its original volume. Just imagine what happens inside sewer pipes when kitty litter is flushed!

Facial tissues, paper towels, cotton swabs: Facial tissues are treated with a chemical binder that takes time to break apart when flushed. The same goes for paper towels and cotton swabs that are made to stay intact.

Rags: These are the worst! When flushed down the toilet, rags backup into the sewer system because they do not break down. When we get these types of clogs we call them “ragbergs,” like an iceberg, but made of rags. Gross, right!?

Chemical Usage

Chemical drain cleaner flows along the bottom of the drain pipe. If used frequently, the chemicals can deteriorate the bottom of the sewer pipe over time. 

Questions? Please call 480-644-2484 or e-mail.