Grease Interceptor Service for Richmond Breweries and Taprooms

The taproom kitchen problem

A brewery that adds a kitchen — or hosts a food truck that plugs into its plumbing — discharges restaurant grease through a building designed for brewing wastewater. Many have interceptors that were sized for the original occupancy, not for a fryer. Spent grain and yeast that reach the same line foul an interceptor faster than grease alone, and the combination smells like nothing else.

The rule applies to you

Richmond’s 100 ppm fat, oil and grease standard (Sec. 28-907) applies to the discharge from the building, whoever is cooking. If a truck or a pop-up kitchen is using your sinks, their grease is your discharge. The city can inspect at any time and can prescribe the grease facilities a building needs — which, for a taproom that has quietly become a restaurant, may be a larger interceptor.

Practical schedule for a brewery kitchen

• Interceptor of 500–1,000 gallons with a modest kitchen: 60–90 days, with a spent-grain check at each service
• Full-time kitchen with fryers: run the calculator on covers, not on the brewery’s intuition
• Hosted food trucks: see the commissary page — put the trap in the agreement
• Keep the interceptor lids clear of kegs, pallets and patio furniture — access is a code requirement

What we do differently for breweries

Service timed around brew days and delivery windows; a look at whether brewing solids are reaching the interceptor; a dated receipt and manifest for the file. If the unit is undersized for what the building now does, we will say so plainly, because the city will say it less kindly.