A grocery is a food service establishment
Chapter 13.40 reaches any facility handling food with a grease-producing process or an exhaust hood, and the ordinance’s own list of examples includes markets with a deli. The deli fryer, the rotisserie drip pans, the bakery, the meat room wash-down and the floor scrubber all share one interceptor, and the solids from the meat and produce sides fill it from the bottom while the fryer fills it from the top.
Where grocery interceptors go wrong
- Solids, not grease, hit 25% first. The rule counts combined FOG and solids against design depth. A tank with a thin cap and a packed bottom chamber is over the line and looks fine from the lid.
- Floor scrubber water. Scrubber dump stations plumbed to the interceptor carry grit and detergent that emulsify the cap. Ask where yours drains.
- Hot case and rotisserie fat goes to the rendering drum, not the mop sink.
- Night-crew wash-down over 140°F is a prohibited discharge, and it melts the cap.
Multi-department records
The three-year file for a grocery has more in it than a restaurant’s: the cleaning log, the kitchen BMP and training log for every department that touches the drain, hauling records for the interceptor and for waste cooking oil, and the percent-full readings. We write the receipt to the six lines and give the store manager a one-page log that departments can initial.
Scheduling
Early morning before deliveries, or the overnight restock window. Interceptor pumping takes twenty minutes and the truck is gone before the doors open.