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Warning! This episode is kind of gross, but still keep watching though…
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Earlier this year, a 64-meter long mass called a fatberg was found in the sewer of Sidmouth,
England., While that’s longer than the Leaning Tower of Pisa is tall, it pales in comparison
to the largest fatberg ever discovered.
That award goes to the Whitechapel fatberg found in 2017 in the sewers beneath London.,
It was 250-meters long, weighed 130 tonnes, and took nine weeks to clear out.
But England isn’t the only country plagued by fatbergs. They have been found in sewer
systems all over the world.
So what exactly are these things?
Fatbergs are a solid mass of waste found in sewers. They consist of things that have been
flushed down the toilet or poured down the drain, like congealed fat, oil, and personal
hygiene products.
One major source that is reportedly wreaking havoc on sewers all over the United States
and Australia are wet wipes. This is because wet wipes don’t disintegrate the same way
that toilet paper does.,, Other common products are diapers and tampons.,
Fatbergs are in part caused when fatty deposits come into contact with calcium and form a
metallic soap., When this soap meets non-biodegradable items in the sewers, they combine and form
deposits on sewer walls. This eventually causes blockages that can lead to overflow, flooding,
and water contamination, resulting in environmental and health risks.,
Not to mention how much they cost to fix.
Thames Water in the UK spends £1 million each month clearing blockages. Sydney Water
spends $8 million each year. And New York City spent $18 million in just five years
on wet wipe related issues.
For fatberg prevention or mitigation, water service companies have been urging their customers
to stop pouring fats and oils down the drain.
Restaurants in particular lead to a lot of grease deposits, since there’s been a noted
connection between fatbergs and food outlets, some water companies are encouraging or even
requiring restaurants to use grease traps to prevent it from going down drains.,
And some cities are even fighting to prevent wet wipe companies from advertising their
products as flushable.
To deal with the accumulating waste, companies are finding ways to put fatbergs to good use.
In the UK, Thames Water partnered with an energy company to convert the fats, oils,
and greases found in fatbergs into clean oil, which can be made into biodiesel,, - a renewable,
clean-burning fuel.
So who knows? Maybe in a few years, we’ll live in a world powered by fatbergs. But also,
maybe not… So don’t flush anything you’re not suppose to. Unless you’re me and you’re
trying to flush yourself down the toilet because a toilet in my world is a portal to your world.
It’s complicated, the real Life Noggin fans know what I’m talking about though!
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