Owl Power Company has announced Vegawatt, a cogeneration system for restaurants and food service facilities. The system turns waste vegetable oil from a restaurant's deep fryer into fuel to generate on-site electricity and hot water.
Any food service locations with fryers can use the Vegawatt system to save $800 per month, the company said. It is a fully automated system that requires no intervention or maintenance by staff, no additional chemicals, and produces no liquid byproducts.
While most restaurant owners receive between $0.10 t0 $0.25 per gallon of used cooking oil, the company says Vegawatt owners will achieve a value of $2.55 per gallon. Owl Power Company says new green energy incentives and Renewable Energy Certificates will increase the payback to the restaurant.
The system has been installed and running since last December at Finz Seafood & Grill.
In 2007, San Francisco launched SFGreasecycle, a free program in which the city picks up used cooking oil and grease from local restaurants and turns it into biodiesel to run city vehicles.