The City of Mercer Island is reminding residents to help keep pipes clean in the city’s sewer system, which occasionally become clogged with fats, oils and grease which gets put into the pipes from kitchens around the Island.

City staff, as part of the sanitary sewer utility, inspect the Island’s 500,000 feet of pipe and 18 pump stations throughout the year. Fats, oils and grease from Island kitchens can severely clog pipes, specifically from meats, cooking oil, lard, shortening, butter and even ice cream. Because using hot water to wash those by-products down the drain will cause them to adhere to the inside of pipes, the city asks that those products be scrapped into the garbage instead of the sink.

The city said if each of the Island’s 7,300 sewer connections scrapped just one teaspoon of grease, oils or fat by-products into the sewer each day, that causes up to 63 55-gallon drums to be cleaned each year.

To learn more, visit the city’s website at www.mercergov.org.