Biofuels have many benefits to the environment; the main one being that the process involves the recycling of waste oils that would otherwise end up in landfill.

Other centres, including thecentre:mk, collect waste oil for conversion, but what makes Liverpool One’s initiative different is the fact that the conversion takes place on site. The process is simple and takes place in a purpose-built biofuel room underneath Liverpool One where waste oils will be converted into clean biofuel in less than 24 hours.

Used cooking oil is fed into the Fuelpod via a series of filtered pumps and is heated over night to 65˚C. The warm oil is then mixed with methanol and potassium hydroxide (the potassium uses the methanol as a carrier and binds the fats within the oil) the products of which are biodiesel and glycerine laden oil, which can be safely used to accelerate compost.

100 litres of used cooking oil yields 100 litres of biodiesel and Liverpool One hopes to produce 200l of biodiesel a week.

The biofuels initiative is part of Liverpool One’s ongoing commitment to lower the carbon footprint of the centre. It forms another strand of a recycling programme that involves paper, card and plastics.