Cities Address Sticky Situation That Can Lead to Sewage Spills

Three years after sewage spills caused a record number of beach closures in Orange County, cities and sanitation agencies are targeting the primary culprit: grease.

Cities in much of the county are under the gun to meet a Dec. 30 deadline that bans restaurant owners and others from pouring cooking grease down the drain, where it can block pipes and send sewage into the ocean.

From Yorba Linda to Newport Beach, 32 cities and water agencies in north and central Orange County are requiring restaurants, school cafeterias and hospitals -- considered the biggest grease producers -- to stop using garbage disposals and instead mop leftover food residue and oil into trashcans. Large grease producers may have to install subterranean interceptor tanks to filter fats and oils out of wastewater.

The aim is to eliminate the whitish goo that clings to the sides of sewer pipes, restricting water flow and eventually causing blockages and spills. Most of the beach closures are the result of contamination from sewage spills that flow into the ocean, either from drains or waterways.

Beach closures are a financial hardship for coastal cities, emptying boardwalks and beachfront businesses after county health officials find poor water quality. In 1999, the water off Huntington Beach became so contaminated that miles of shoreline had to be closed during the height of summer.

Since Orange County suffered 51 beach closures in 2001, the yearly number has been cut in half. So far this year, there have been 25 closures, according to Orange County Health Care Agency records.

Some restaurant owners, however, think cities are targeting the wrong crowd.

“We’ve been trained decades upon decades to keep grease from going down the drain,” said Dan Marcheano, who owns the the Arches restaurant in Newport Beach. “Logic would tell you that I wouldn’t want to deal with a plumber at 8 o’clock on a Friday or Saturday night.”

Marcheano thinks officials should put more effort into educating homeowners not to throw food and grease into the sink.

“If you have a restaurant that has 300 dinners on a Saturday night and you have 300 residences serving dinners on the table, those households will produce more grease going down drains than any restaurant,” he said.

Grease buildup in sewers has become such a nuisance in recent years that the Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board in 2002 ordered local sewage collection agencies to come up with a sewer maintenance plan to help eliminate sewage spills. The grease ordinances being heard before city councils this fall are the result of that push.

Although cities and water agencies that own sewer lines must write their own ordinances, the basic requirements are the same. Most call for new restaurants to install grease interceptors or grease traps -- scaled-down versions of interceptors that sit above ground but aren’t as efficient -- while existing restaurants are evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

Grease interceptors can cost anywhere from $5,000 to $40,000. Water from a kitchen sink flows into underground tanks where grease floats to the top and food residue sinks to the bottom. A pipe at mid-water level carries relatively grease-free water into the sewer.

Almost every city plans to issue annual permits to food establishments with fees ranging from $15 to several hundred dollars to help pay for sewer upkeep.

The average Outback Steakhouse or Claim Jumper restaurant can generate 5,000 gallons of grease in a month, said Ken Theisen, staff environmental scientist for the Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board.

“We’re basically telling people we think grease-caused sewage spills are preventable, and they need to prevent as many of them as they can,” Theisen said.

Newport Beach has had an anti-grease ordinance in place for 10 years, but an even tougher law is set to go before the City Council next month. Officials are asking the city’s 375 restaurants to pay renewable permit fees, with restaurants that have good track records getting discounts. The annual fees would range from as little as $15 up to $800.

If a restaurant expands or changes its menu, owners might be required to install underground grease tanks, said Assistant City Manager Dave Kiff. Restaurants that need a grease interceptor but don’t have the space will have to follow as many management practices as they can and pay annual fees of $700 to $800.

City officials think restaurants are getting a fair offer.

“We’re saying that the mom-and-pop restaurants that produce grease will still have to clean those pipes somehow,” Kiff said. Instead of having to spend $40,000 for an interceptor, he said, the city will charge a restaurant $700 to $800 to help pay for added sewer maintenance. If a restaurant appears to be following the rules and not producing much grease, the city “should lower the fees,” Kiff said.

The California Restaurant Assn. is pleased that cities are willing to be flexible rather than simply forcing every restaurant to install expensive grease interceptors.

“We had a choice. We could work with them or we could be part of the problem,” said Andrew Casana, regional representative for the association.To ensure compliance, cities are employing a variety of tools, including the standard plumbers’ snake and remote-controlled sewer cameras.

By looking at the pipes that connect a restaurant with the main sewer line, sanitation officers can tell if restaurant employees are still pouring grease down the drain.

Standing in the kitchen of his restaurant one day last week, Marcheano said his staff had kept grease and food away from the sink since he became owner in 1982.

A chef poured used oil from a frying pan into a bucket on the floor. A dishwasher emptied leftover food into a large plastic garbage can. Inside the sink, a metal colander caught any chunks he missed while the water passed through two more food debris filters under the sink.

The food and grease buckets, Marcheano said, are emptied several times a day into a special garbage bin outside. He pays a contractor who specializes in grease-waste to empty that bin every two weeks. Good management, Marcheano said, has kept him from having to call a plumber because of a grease blockage for nearly a decade.