Run Your Car For Free: Montgomery Co. Connects Grease Users to Greasy Spoons

MONTGOMERY CO., Md. (WUSA) -- Here's the good news: there's a way you can fuel your car for free. Here's the bad: you need a diesel, and it may involve a bit of mucking about.

Montgomery County has a new plan to give you a friend in the oil business. The cooking oil business, that is.

"Inside there is used cooking oil," says Chuck Becker, pointing to an extra tank on his 2002 Volkswagen Jetta.

Chuck Becker's favorite Mexican restaurant really gives him gas. He runs the Jetta on old tortilla chip grease.

At Sandy Spring Friends School, they're running a whole fleet of buses on bio-diesel refined from used cooking oil.

"Even though it smells like French fries, it's good for the environment, and we're helping out," says student Ava Talbott, 14.

Rebelling against high gas prices, a growing number of people are plunking down a few hundred dollars for a kit to convert their diesel vehicles to burn vegetable oil. They still get great mileage; it's less polluting; and performance is unchanged.

"It's good for the environment, good for the kids, and good for the school," says Dan Goodman of BioDiesel University, who provides the bio-diesel for Sandy Spring Friends School.

Looking to encourage more people across the region to take a dive into hot oil, Montgomery County is just out with a new website that aims to connect grease users across the region with folks who are trying to get rid of it.

"It takes something that would normally be discarded in the trash or down the drain and it becomes a useable resource," says Rick Dimont, of Montgomery County's Division of Solid Waste.

This is a classic win-win situation. It's a plus for drivers. And it's a plus for restaurants.

"You can hear that snap crackle pop," says John McManus of the Barking Dog pub in Bethesda, as he tosses a bunch of chicken wings into the fryer.

McManus just got a call for a guy looking for a grease fix.

"This is the old grease that came out of the fryer after we were done using it," McManus says while opening a 35 lb. bottle of brown oil that's waiting for a grease burning car driver to pick it up.

McManus used to pay $350 to have someone haul it away. The Barking Dog fills a 55 gallon drum with used grease every four to five weeks.

McManus can hardly believe somebody wants to come pick it up to use as fuel. "Our old grease can fuel a Suburban for a week."

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