The municipalities of Maia, Seixal and Oeiras show the best results in the collection of edible oils of domestic origin in 2022, according to a survey of municipalities with more than 100 thousand inhabitants published this Friday by the Zero association.
According to the data collection work carried out by the environmental association Zero, the best collection rates of used cooking oils of domestic origin occur in the municipalities of Maia (0.29 liters per inhabitant/year), Seixal (0.22) and Oeiras (0.21), followed by Matosinhos (0.19) and Amadora (0.18).
However, there are many municipalities that collect only 0.01 or 0.02 liters per inhabitant/year.
“The first conclusion we can draw is that we have a country at various speeds, because we have municipalities that collect almost a third of a liter of domestic cooking oil per inhabitant/year (0.29 liters/year) and others that collect 0.01 or 0.02 liters/year, that is, almost 30 times less,” Rui Berkemeier, from Associação Zero, told the Lusa agency.
According to Rui Berkemeier, “There are municipalities that have collection networks that are already well established and consolidated, and that already have interesting collection data, and there are others that are practically at the beginning.”
“We have a very wide offer here within these large municipalities of more than 100,000 inhabitants,” he added.
Rui Berkemeier stated that Zero decided to carry out this survey among the 308 municipalities in the country, but the majority did not respond, and only after some insistence. It was possible to obtain data from all municipalities with more than 100 thousand inhabitants, except for Louresone of the municipalities that never made the requested data available.
“It is important to understand what happens in homes and in the collections that municipalities must make in relation to oil of national origin,” explained Rui Berkemeier, adding that Zero intends to repeat the initiative to obtain data by 2023.
“There is no official information available on the management, especially of oils that originate in Portuguese homes,” lamented the person in charge, recalling that used cooking oils “These are wastes that cause problems.either in wastewater treatment or in the sewer network itself.”
According to the study, the national collection of used cooking oils has focused on the so-called oleões, but the municipality of Braga has focused mainly on door-to-door collection, upon request, a solution that the association admits as possible options to meet national recycling targets.
Door-to-door collection, according to Rui Berkemeier, not only prevents the theft of oils installed on public roads, but also “prevents the contamination of used oils by acts of vandalism, often related to theft, and can be an interesting solution to increase the quantities of used cooking oil collected by municipalities.”
Source: Observadora
