Buckets for recycling household grease have appeared on porches throughout Washington recently. Now that the Green Grease recycling company has passed out its white grease recycling buckets to homes across the city of Washington, people are trying to remember exactly how to use them.

The white buckets are des igned to be filled with used cooking oil and grease, to be set out on Thursdays to be picked up by a Green Grease LLC representative on the city’s recycling schedule.

The 1.25-gallon spill-proof containers were first passed out to residents of apartments, public housing, and other multi-family residences, and by the end of August, most single-family homes in Washington had been given a bucket.

“We would rather hand the containers to residents and explain how to recycle their household grease,” said Warren Crawley, CEO of Green Grease, “but if nobody was home, we just left the container with instructions.”

Some city residents did not get the instructions or were unclear on when the recycling was to be picked up, City Administrator Mike Eskew said. Others had put their buckets out but nobody picked them up. “If you have a question or a problem with recycling your waste oil, call City Hall 706- 678-3277, and we’ll take care of it.”

The city was working with Green Grease to smooth out problems with the new grease recycling, working to get the service in sync with the city’s Thursday pickup of the familiar yellow and blue recycling bags.

“Recycling grease is a great idea, even if you’re not much of a recycler,” Eskew said. “It keeps the used grease from clogging up your home’s pipes, and it keeps it out of the city’s waste system. We really want to make this work, so if anyone has questions or needs their oil picked up, call City Hall.”