Cooking oil recycling service gets a boost with free biofuel

Les Amis’ oil recycling service will be further reducing its carbon footprint by running its collection van on free biofuel supplied by a local business. The service, which employs adults with learning disabilities, is being supported by the Roberts Garages Group, which includes Petroleum Distributors Jersey and they will fund the fuel costs for oil collections for the next two years, saving the charity around £5,000.

Les Amis, which is celebrating 50 years of empowering people with learning disabilities in 2025, set up its Recycling Team in 2017 and since then has collected over one million litres of waste cooking oil from island businesses, saving them from having to dispose of it. The waste oil is filtered by the team and sent to the UK for conversion into biofuel. The amount recycled so far is the equivalent of over 3,600 full bathtubs.*

Alex Black, Les Amis’ Facilities Manager, said:

“The Les Amis Oil Recycling Service was originally set up to provide purposeful employment for adults with learning disabilities. Due to their hard work and success the service has grown exponentially, where, as of the end of November they had collected over 1.1 million litres of oil. Without our intervention, and with no dedicated facility capable of effectively disposing of this huge amount of waste, there was always the potential this oil could’ve ended up unsafely burned in the incinerators, or worse in Jersey’s water supply and beaches. We are thrilled with this support from Roberts Garages as it will not only help our team continue their amazing work but also reduces our carbon footprint.”

As operational costs continue to rise, the charity needs as much help as possible to continue reducing the Island’s waste.

Ricky Davey, Group Executive Director for Roberts Garages Group, added:

“Les Amis’ oil collection van clocks up thousands of miles every year as it goes around the island collecting waste oil from businesses. This is such an amazing initiative that helps to reduce waste and provides full-time work for islanders with learning disabilities. We’re pleased that we can help by covering this fixed cost as the brilliant Les Amis Recycling Team collect their next million litres of waste cooking oil.”

*Based on the standard UK bath holding 300 litres of water.