Beneficial use of brown grease - A green source of petroleum-derived hydrocarbons

Brown grease, formed as cooking oils and food fats, entering sewage systems is a major urban problem. We have shown that brown grease can be converted to a mixture of aliphatic hydrocarbons by heating under relatively mild conditions. This mixture contains primarily n-alkanes and 1-alkenes with between 8 and 30 carbon atoms in the chain. Furthermore, this conversion occurs without addition of a catalyst, which is significant because the water and impurities in brown grease would destroy or deactivate many metal or metal oxide catalysts that have been used in model systems.