Attack of the 800 Foot Fatberg

Fair warning, Dear Reader: You may not want to read this one while eating breakfast.

The word fatberg did not show up in dictionaries until 2015, but I’m sure it’s here to stay. Most of us have heard of fatbergs by now, and have a vague sense of what they are. They’re those masses of grease and gunk and garbage that clog up our sewer systems. Eeew.

But really, what are they specifically? Why are they becoming a crisis of epic proportions, and what can we do about them? I have spent several hours figuratively slogging through the sewer systems of the world in order to answer those questions for you, Dear Reader. So let’s dive in, so to speak, while thanking our lucky stars that our electronic devices don’t have a scratch n’ sniff component.

How fatbergs form:

In a perfect world, our sewer systems would have nothing but smooth pipes with no snags, and we, being the responsible, civic-minded human beings that we are, would only deposit those things for which the sewer system is intended: body wastes, water, and toilet paper. I can’t stress this enough: Nothing else should go into the sewer system. And by that I mean NOTHING ELSE.

Unfortunately, many people have taken to using these systems as trash cans. And remember, your toilet is not the only entrance to this system. Things enter through showers, sinks, washing machines and street drains as well. But let’s back up a bit (pardon the pun).

Let’s enter the average sewer system. Many of them are very old. They’ve bent and buckled over time due to temperature fluctuations. They’ve deteriorated due to corrosion, and have lost the war against tree root invasion. Every sewer system on earth is full of snags. Most of these snags are on the sides of the pipes, not on the bottom, where the water flow has kept things smooth.

As the water flows past the snags, though, it creates water turbulence. That turbulence then catches the more solid items that should never have been there in the first place. Those items spin round and round, collecting more disgusting stuff, soaking up solidified grease which also should never have been there, and getting stuck together and increasingly stuck on the snag. And these balls of grossness get bigger, and bigger, and bigger… (Cue the Jaws music.)

Mostly, fatbergs go undetected until all water flow is blocked, and the sewage starts backing up and overflowing into our waterways. By then the fatberg has become the consistency of concrete. Cities of any notable size spend millions of dollars a year dealing with fatbergs, and they pass those costs on to you. (If you really want lower taxes, you might consider not causing problems that will cost your city a fortune as a consequence. Just sayin’.)

One enormous fatberg, lurking beneath Liverpool, England, weighed 440 tons. (That’s 880,000 pounds, in case you were wondering.) It was about as long as 2 ½ American football fields. It cost nearly 13 million dollars to remove.

How do we cause fatbergs?

The primary culprits, by far, are wet wipes. Even if those wipes say they are flushable on their packaging, they are most definitely NOT flushable. First of all, they are meant to be stronger than toilet paper, and the material often contains plastic. And since they are very good at soaking up things, they soak up the fat, oil and grease in the sewer system. So a wet wipe floats along, gets stuck on a snag, soaks up grease, catches more stuff, and so on. I can’t emphasize this enough:

DO NOT FLUSH WET WIPES!!!

Here’s the thing. (And, yes, there’s always a thing.) There is no industry standard to determine what “flushable” actually means. There have been quite a few lawsuits against the companies that produce wet wipes, but the wet wipe lobby must be very powerful in Washington, because I could not find a single lawsuit in America that was actually won by the plaintiff. No big surprise there. Wet wipes are a 2-billion-dollar a year industry. On the other hand, in the UK (home of the gigantic fatberg mentioned above), they have managed to ban the sale of wet wipes containing plastic. Well done, Brits!

The reason we’re hearing more and more about fatbergs is that wet wipes are not just for babies anymore. The industry has come up with a lot of other ways to convince us to buy them. There are antibacterial wipes; disinfecting wipes; body wash wipes; and facial cleansing, eyeglass cleaning, cosmetic removing and acne wipes, to name a few.

Our use of these wipes skyrocketed during COVID due to the toilet paper shortage. And now they have become what appears to be an unbreakable habit. They are convenient, no doubt, but think about it. We have survived for thousands of years without them. Our need for them is purely artificial. So next time you reach for one, think of it as a baby fatberg. Just say no.

What else has been found in fatbergs?

Dental floss makes an excellent fatberg binder. Fat, oil, grease, soap scum, body wash, dishwashing liquid, shampoo and lotions and human waste provide plenty of goo. Other things that have been found include packs of cigarettes, condoms, plastic cutlery, mop heads, cocaine, MDMA, paper towels, tennis balls, plastic bags, potato chip bags, tampons, sanitary napkins, diapers, paper, microplastics, the contents of garbage disposals, wood planks, needles, Q-tips and cotton balls.

Why are fatbergs such a hazard?

Not only do they back up sewage systems, causing our waste to flow into the environment, but also fatbergs themselves have been known to have pieces break off and wash up on beaches. Make no mistake, these things are toxic. They are usually coated with a thick layer of bacteria and are infused with worms and fly larvae. Dogs and kids are fascinated by them. Simply touching one can cause a host of health issues. And if ingested, the fat can lodge in their throats.

So what can we do to combat fatbergs?

First of all, we all need to own the fact that we have all been complicit in fatberg creation. We must become more mindful of what we allow to go into our sewers. The most impactful thing we can do is to avoid using wet wipes of any kind.

Other things we can do:

Avoid flushing dental floss.
Stop using our garbage disposals for any reason (and as more and more municipalities are offering compost pick up, there’s really no need for them anyway).
Don’t be a litterbug! Most of what litters our streets and sidewalks winds up going through street drains and into the sewer system.
Laundry to Landscape Greywater Systems are ridiculously simple to set up, and they are an excellent way to water your flowers, landscaping, trees and lawn without increasing your water bill or adding to the sewage load. Most people send 15 gallons of water per person per day through their washing machine. What a waste, and doing that plus watering your lawn is such an unnecessary strain on the watershed. Most U.S. states don’t even require permits to install these systems. If it were up to me, I’d always have a greywater system. I had one for 26 years in Florida. Lets all keep detergent and microfibers from adding to fatbergs while recycling water! Win/win!

But by far my personal favorite fatberg buster: Install a bidet. It doesn’t have to be a separate stand. They now make attachments you can place on your existing toilet. I blogged about my love affair with my bidet here. Once you get into the bidet habit, you’ll rarely need toilet paper, let alone wet wipes. Think of it as hugging a tree and killing a fatberg at the same time. You rock!

Please do spread the word about fatbergs, even if it might be an awkward conversation. The only silver lining to them is that they can be used as biofuel, but we can definitely create that in much more cost-effective and less disgusting ways. It’s high time, Dear Reader, that we start taking our sh*t seriously, because we have ample evidence that if we don’t, we’ll pay for it.

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The View from a Drawbridge

The random musings of an autistic bridgetender with entirely too much time on her hands.