undefined | Better HN

0 pointsneilv2y ago0 comments

On the garbage disposal, I've heard that water treatment facility managers hate them (or at least one does), because it encourages people to put through food waste.

I've also heard landlords say garbage disposals are a net-negative for maintenance visits: disposal-related problems are more costly than the occasional clog because someone put down something the disposal would've stopped.

Also, in multi-tenant buildings, disposals can be a nightmare. Too many people with varying folk wisdom of what's good to put down it. Some people create blockages for the entire stack or more, which ends up causing powered backflows of nasty wastewater into some units. And then what eventually gets snaked out of the drain, and dragged across their kitchens... mere bleach will never get that sufficiently clean. (Even after 3 of these kitchen-apocalypse episodes, you just can't get some people to understand that they can't keep grinding orange peels in their disposal to freshen the air, even when the rot of previous orange peels in the increasing blockage they created might be the reason they want to freshen the air now.)

I try to tell people that pretty much only water and dish soap should go down the drain, and that one of those few-dollar mesh drain strainers is a great tool to help follow this rule. (Also, a container for collecting most of the grease/oil that would otherwise go down the drain.)

0 comments

computator2y ago

> garbage disposal ... encourages people to put through food waste

That's like saying bicycles encourage people to ride bicycles. It's supposed to encourage it. That's the literal purpose of a garbage disposal unit: "a device that shreds food waste into pieces small enough—generally less than 2 mm (0.079 in) in diameter—to pass through plumbing."[1]

> Some people create blockages for the entire stack or more

I don't know how that could happen since if you put something into a garbage disposal unit that can't be shredded to tiny particles, then it's the garbage disposal unit itself that will get clogged, not the pipes or drains. Whatever gets through the garbage disposal unit is going to be less than 2mm in size, and generally much smaller and liquified. If you're referring to oil or grease buildup in pipes, that is irrelevant to the use of a garbage disposal unit since people can and do pour oil or grease down the drain whether they have a garbage disposal unit or not.

In my opinion, a garbage disposal unit is an under-appreciated and supremely useful kitchen appliance, and extremely environmentally friendly (see the brief Wikipedia explanation[2]).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garbage_disposal_unit

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garbage_disposal_unit#Rational...

neilvOP2y ago

I have repeated, traumatic, first-hand experience with this: food waste accumulates in building pipe bends and joints and such, causing blockages and follow-on effects worse than one would guess.

And the disposal, and myths about what's good to put down the pipes, means a lot of people put that food waste down there.

I don't know the original reason for the adoption of disposals, but smells like it could be corporate lobbying to create a market for a product:

> In many cities in the United States in the 1930s and the 1940s, the municipal sewage system had regulations prohibiting placing food waste (garbage) into the system.[5] InSinkErator spent considerable effort, and was highly successful in convincing many localities to rescind these prohibitions.[6]

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse