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Bathing In Death -- A Look Inside a Rendering Plant

 

 

12/09/05 Source: Earth Island Journal

 

Editor Comment: The next time you lather up with your favorite

shampoo

or body soap you should strongly consider the source of the main

ingredient -- DEAD ANIMAL FAT! It appears in the form of tallow and

glycerine.

 

 

 

---

-----------

 

 

A Look Inside a Rendering Plant

 

by GS

 

Rendering has been called " the silent industry. " Each year in the

US,

286 rendering plants quietly dispose of more than 12.5 million tons

of

dead animals, fat and meat wastes. As the public relations watchdog

newsletter PR Watch observes, renderers " are thankful that most

people

remain blissfully unaware of their existence. "

 

When City Paper reporter Van Smith visited Baltimore's Valley

Proteins

rendering plant last summer, he found that the " hoggers " (the large

vats

used to grind and filter animal tissues prior to deep-fat frying)

held

an eclectic mix of body parts ranging from " dead dogs, cats,

raccoons,

possums, deer, foxes [and] snakes " to a " baby circus elephant'' and

the

remains of Bozeman, a Police Department quarterhorse that " died in

the

line of duty. "

 

In an average month, Baltimore's pound hands over 1,824 dead animals

to

Valley Proteins. Last year, the plant transformed 150 millions

pounds of

decaying flesh and kitchen grease into 80 million pounds of

commercial

meat and bone meal, tallow and yellow grease. Thirty years ago, most

of

the renderer's wastes came from small markets and slaughterhouses.

Today, thanks to the proliferation of fast-food restaurants, nearly

half

the " raw material " is kitchen grease and frying oil.

 

Recycling dead pets and wildlife into animal food is " a very small

part

of the business that we don't like to advertise, " Valley Proteins'

president J. J. Smith told City Paper. The plant processes these

animals

as a " public service, not for profit, " Smith said, since ''there is

not

a lot of protein and fat [on pets]..., just a lot of hair you have

to

deal with somehow. "

 

According to the City Paper, Valley Proteins " sells inedible animal

parts and rendered material to Alpo, Heinz and Ralston-Purina. "

Valley

Proteins insists that it does not sell " dead-pet byproducts " to pet

food

firms since " they are all very sensitive to the recycled pet

potential. "

Valley Proteins maintains two production lines -- one for clean meat

and

bones and a second line for dead pets and wildlife. However, Smith

reported, " the protein material is a mix from both production lines.

Thus the meat and bone meal made at the plant includes materials

from

pets and wildlife, and about five percent of that product goes to

dry-pet-food manufacturers.... "

 

A 1991 USDA report states that, " approximately 7.9 billion pounds of

meat and bone meal, blood meal and feather meal [were] produced in

1983. " Of that amount, 34 percent was used in pet food, 34 percent

in

poultry feed, 20 percent in pig food and ten percent in beef and

dairy

cattle feed.

 

Transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE) carried in pig and

chicken-laden foods eventually may eclipse the threat of " Mad Cow

Disease. " The risk of household pet-exposure to TSE from

contaminated

pet food is more than three times greater than the risk for

hamburger-eating humans.

 

Source:

http://www.earthisland.org/eijournal/new_articles.cfm?

articleID=499 & journalID=58

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" Jay Jones " wrote:

Bathing In Death -- A Look Inside a Rendering Plant

12/09/05 Source: Earth Island Journal

Editor Comment: The next time you lather up with your favorite

shampoo

 

 

--> FYI courtesy of 'big bro' :

liposuction soap

 

Manly Soap

Following /Fight Club/'s recipe for fun and profit

by Patrick Di Justo <http://www.gettingit.com/author/8> Published

November 11, 1999 <http://www.gettingit.com/date/1999-11-11> in Scope

<http://www.gettingit.com/section/3>

[/Warning: Patrick DiJusto is a trained journalist and, as such, takes

no responsibility for his physical safety. GettingIt therefore does not

recommend doing anything he suggests -- ed./]

See also...

 

From primitive hunter-gatherer societies to dippy Robert Bly weekend

retreats, that elusive concept /manhood/ has mostly been defined as a

combination of strength and knowledge.

But the recent film /Fight Club/ more stringently defines manhood as

the strength to brawl bare chested in basements with total strangers,

and the knowledge of how to make soap.

 

Ancient Roman legend specifies the birthplace of soap as Mt. Sapo, the

mountain of animal sacrifices. Wood ash contains a great deal of

potassium hydroxide, a simple alkali, and when the ashes of the burned

pyres mixed with melted animal fats,

a primitive form of soap resulted. /Fight Club/'s prescription to make

soap from human liposuction fat, however, is not the most practical.

 

Soapmaker Kathy Miller is disgusted by the very idea of liposuction soap.

She insists that since the specifics of human fat (like iodine value and

melting point) are not commonly known by the soapmaking community,

you would be likely to wind up with an uneven soap. However, she

reluctantly speculates that human fat " would be similar to lard, since

humans and pigs are both omnivores. "

Armed with this information, for legal and safety reasons, we're going

to give the basic recipe for lard-based soapmaking, and leave the

substitution of any other fat to the reader.

0. EQUIPMENT

To break down fat globules into something useful, you'll need an 18

ounce container of sodium hydroxide, (a.k.a. lye, a.k.a. Red Devil --

look in the supermarket drain-cleaner aisle, usually on the lowest

shelf), a huge enamel or stainless steel pot, a large Pyrex or stainless

steel mixing bowl /with a spout/, thick rubber gloves, eye goggles,

plastic stirring spoons, two thermometers, some trashbags, some shallow

cardboard boxes, 1 pound of olive oil, a roll of duct tape, and a

relatively clean kitchen. You'll also need 8 pounds of hard fats. Rancid

fats make terrible soap so -- wherever you get your fats -- be sure to

get a fresh batch.

 

1. RENDERING THE FAT AND MAKING THE MOLDS

Fill one of the large pots with a 50/50 mixture of fat and water. Bring

the mixture to a low rolling boil. This will make your kitchen smell

like a combination slaughterhouse/unflushed toilet, so open the window

or turn on the oven fan or something. Let the mixture boil for three hours.

If any gray lumps or blood rise to the top, carefully skim.

Remember, alternative fats (you know what we're talking about) may be

tainted with HIV or Hepatitis C, so take precautions. Stir the mixture

every 15-20 minutes, and continue to add water as the brew boils off.

While the fat is boiling, duct tape the trashbags to the inside of the

boxes.

You want to end up with a completely watertight seal on the inside of

the boxes.

These are your soap molds. Make about six. At the end of three hours,

set the pot aside. When it is cool to the touch, refrigerate it. The

next morning, there should be a layer of whitish-yellow fat atop a pot

of nasty water. Skim off the fat, throw away the water, wash the pot, on

to step 2.

 

2. MIXING THE LYE

Put on the goggles and rubber gloves. Wear long sleeves and long pants.

Send kids and pets outside.

Open the windows or even better, go outside. You're working with

concentrated sodium hydroxide here, and it's no time to fool around.

Place 54 ounces of water in the mixing bowl, and carefully sprinkle the

entire can of lye into the water, stirring constantly with a plastic

stirring spoon. Keep your face away from the fumes. The mixture will

begin to heat up, as the lye endothermically reacts with the water -- in

some cases, the mixture starts boiling! Set this bowl aside (if indoors,

the sink works best) to cool.

Lye is probably the most dangerous substance you will ever deal with.

This stuff is like the juice from /Alien/. NEVER mix lye in an aluminum

bowl.

If you splash your skin with lye, wash the area in cold running water

immediately. If you splash your eye with lye because, like a jerk, you

weren't wearing your goggles, rinse the eye with cold running water and

rush to the emergency room, where they have the equipment to painlessly

remove your eyeball.

 

3. MELTING THE FATS

Put the olive oil into the big pot, and set it over low heat. Add the

hard fat into the pot, and stir until it is melted. Do not boil. Stir

until the fats are liquid and clear.

4. TRACING

Keep your gloves and goggles on. When the temperature of the lye and the

fats are both between 95-105 degrees Fahrenheit (use the thermometers),

turn off the heat, and CAREFULLY pour the lye into the pot of fat. Do

not splash it. Grab a plastic stirring spoon and stir like a mad scientist.

Keep this up for 15 minutes. The mixture will bubble and heat up on its

own. Keep stirring as the mixture thickens into custard, then pudding,

then applesauce. When the mixture is cool and thick enough to hold the

spoon upright (45 minutes), it is ready.

5. CURING

Carefully pour the proto-soap into the molds. The mixture is still

loaded with lye, so don't spill it. Smooth the surface with the stirring

spoon, and leave the molds out overnight.

The next day (or possibly the day after), the soap will be hard enough

to cut. Cut the soap into bars, and let them cure for three weeks. Using

this soap too soon can result in serious burns, as the lye and fat will

not totally be converted to soap yet.

6. DISTRIBUTION

After three weeks, test the soap on your hands. If it lathers and does

not sting, you've made soap out of your favorite fat, and can probably

get rich selling it. If the soap doesn't work, throw it away and don't

look back. That's what being a man is all about.

/ /

/Thanks to /Fight Club/, Patrick DiJusto is a lot leaner and cleaner./

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