As a part of Blue’s ‘Used Cooking Oil Awareness Campaign’ launched in September 2016, students across the country were educated on the effective disposal of used cooking oil. The initiative targeted students, involving them in recycling practices while ensuring that the used cooking oil was converted into biodiesel. This positive exercise resulted in the collecting 162 litres of waste.
In order to engage the students, a competition was held over the last 6 months amongst various schools, such as – Delhi Private School, Little Flower English School, The Elite English School, GEMS New Millennium School, and The Kindergarten Starters School – to recognise the largest collector.
This exercise, through the demonstration of the harmful impact of used cooking oil on Ras al Khor’s ecosystem, proved that every negative can be turned into a positive with the right mindset. Students were encouraged to collect used cooking oil from their respective homes and drop it in the blue bins placed in the participating schools. This resulted in preserving our natural resources as 410 kg of CO2 emissions were offset against this initiative – enough to power an average car for nearly 16 hours or an average house for nearly 12 days.
The campaign has paved a positive path towards a long-term future as Blue has installed permanent collection channels in the existing schools while diversifying to other schools and institutions such as Al Ittihad School and Al Falah University, ensuring a larger reach in the United Arab Emirates.