Did you know that for every liter of oil that we throw down the drain, approximately 1000 liters of water are contaminated? Day after day, for the preparation of our meals, many of us use the oil for cooking food. It’s present in rice, in the steak of our green Peruvian noodles, the delicious picarones, and the chicharrones that many Peruvians enjoy eating.
But what happens when that oil ends up being used? What do we do with it? Of course, it cannot be reused for cooking again because it is bad for health. Heat degenerates our oil and toxic compounds are generated in it, increasing the risk of ingesting contaminating by-products that will inevitably enter our food.
So what can we do with the used oil that we have at home? It is recommended to store it in a container to take it to a collection point so that this waste can be properly disposed of.
The correct way to store our oil is as follows:
- Wait until it’s completely cold
- Get a plastic or glass bottle, whichever is available
- Place a funnel in the spout to avoid spilling the oil
- Over the funnel, place a strainer to separate the impurities from our oil
- Close the bottle tightly and keep it until it is full
- When the bottle is full, you can take it to a collection point to take care of it
Some of the collection points that we find in Lima, we can find them in:
- San Isidro:
📍Andrés Reyes Park - Miraflores:
📍 La Mar Avenue Block 9
📍 Ernesto Diez Canseco Avenue Block 7 (Near Traditions Park).
📍 Ramón Castilla Avenue crossing Luis Arias Schreiber
📍 General Suárez Avenue crossing Gonzáles Prada. - La Molina:
📍 In front of the Municipality (Elias Aparicio Avenue 740)
📍 La Molina Avenue Block 10 (crossing Javier Prado Avenue) - San Borja:
📍 San Juan Masías sports complex
📍 The Plaza Marquina, Limatambo
📍 Kallpa Wasi Plant in the 2nd block of Buena Vista Avenue - Surco:
📍 Wong of Garden Las Gardenias
📍 Enrique Salazar Barreto 588 (Recycling Oil collection point) - San Juan de Miraflores:
📍 San Juan de Miraflores Main Square
📍 Avenue Vargas Machuca crossing Jesús Morales Avenue
If your district is not among those mentioned, you can always call your municipality to ask if they have centers where you can take your waste. In addition, there are also companies that recycle used oil.
The best known are:
- @reciclandoaceite They make soaps and candles with the used oil.
- @emmaxperu They transform your used oil into biodiesel, a fuel that generates fewer emissions.
- @rpambientalperu They use used cooking oil to transform it into BIO Energy.
- @cilsaperu They transform cooking oil into lubricating oil for industrial, hydraulic, mechanical, and automatic transmission and motor oil.