Jersey retirement community turns kitchen waste into fuel

Bill Sperry didn’t mind all the joking around when he told neighbors at his Morris County retirement community he was helping to convert used frying oil into fuel for the community’s shuttle buses.

“There was a lot of teasing going on about whether it would smell like french fries,” he said with a laugh.

As a retired engineer who worked for 35 years on major projects such as the development of Mylar and Dacron at Dupont, the 77-year-old Sperry makes an unlikely eco-activist. And the place he calls home – the Cedar Crest retirement community in Pequannock – might seem an unlikely place for an environmental laboratory.

But Sperry and the management of Cedar Crest haven’t let that stop them. The 130-acre retirement community has embarked on an ambitious effort to cut down on the pollution it generates – and save on fuel bills – by converting used soybean oil into a fuel known as biodiesel.

Sperry, a resident since 2003 who is licensed as a chemical engineer and serves on a national licensing board committee, helped write the safety and operating instructions and helped select the machinery used to process the fuel.

The converted cooking oil does not smell like french fries, Sperry insisted. In fact, he added, “it’s a better lubricant than diesel fuel. It cleans the engine out better.”

The idea came as a challenge from Cedar Crest’s parent company, Erickson Retirement Communities, and it’s been a hit with residents, said Cathy Guttman, the community’s executive director.

“Our residents in general are very concerned and very interested in how they can reduce their carbon footprint, not only for themselves but more importantly for their children, their grandchildren and their great-grandchildren,” she said. “They’re very proud that we’re making a difference.”

Getting the project off the ground cost $18,000, said Rich Ferguson, project manager. But since the retirement community is saving $1,200 a month on fuel and on carting away used cooking oil, the project should eventually pay for itself, he said.

Already, Cedar Crest has fielded calls not only from other retirement communities that share their parent company, but also from local businesses that were intrigued when they learned about the biodiesel conversion plant and are now considering similar projects, Ferguson said.

That’s exactly what Sperry hoped might happen.

“This little bit we’re doing here isn’t going to change anything,” he said, “but if more people do the same thing, it should help in conserving resources.”

Read the full article Jersey retirement community turns kitchen waste into fuel | Science updates | NewJerseyNewsroom.com — Your State. Your News. By Maura McDermott