Grease boulders get caught in the sanitary sewer system and cause back-ups and other costly problems.

The city of Elmhurst wants to better inform operators of restaurants about the need to keep their grease traps clean and prevent the boulders from getting into the sewers. It is planning to invite dozens of business owners from throughout the city to workshops that will be held before the end of the year to educate them on what grease can do to a sewer system and what their responsibilities are for keeping their traps, which are designed to capture grease, clean.

The city also plans to step up inspections of restaurants’ grease traps.  Restaurant owners need to have a manifest available to city inspectors that shows when their traps were cleaned.

“It’s what the hauler leaves with the owner once he hauls the grease away,” said waste water treatment manager Gary Smith.

The city also is planning to do a survey of businesses to identify what sort of business they operate and what the potential is for grease to be generated. He said how often a trap needs to be cleaned varies according to the kind of restaurant it is and how much grease they produce. The city also will create diagrams to show where the restaurants’ grease traps are located to make it easier for inspectors to find them.

Recently, the city discovered two grease boulders in the system. Workers were able to remove them before they got to the waste water treatment plant. The city uses cameras to view the lines and determine where obstructions are occurring. Smith said grease in the sewers is a fairly common problem that takes money and manpower to address before it causes a sanitary overflow. He said the obstructions are not viewable from the street.

If a grease  obstruction is left in place, however, “in the worst-case scenario it would plug it up and make a mess,” Smith said.

The city tries to dissolve or break up the grease balls before they get to the waste water treatment plant or to a pump station where they would be even more expensive to remove.

The city already has an ordinance that requires restaurant operators to take responsibility to see that grease traps are kept clean. The traps are usually located in alleys. Smith said restaurant operators usually hire contractors to empty the traps on a regular basis. Anyone who is cited for violating the ordinance on keeping traps clean is subject to fines that range from $50 to $500 per incident, according to the ordinance.

Smith said the date for the workshops has not yet been set, but the city will probably hold one in the morning and one in the afternoon to make it easy for business owners to attend.