Talk:Fatberg

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The article gives the impression that flushable wipes are primarily responsible for the formation of the fatbergs. The references supporting this are quotes from municipal employees who have no cited expertise in distinguishing flushable wipes from non flushable wipes.

What effort that has been done indicates that a small percentage of the fat berg wipes are of the flushable type and that flushing non flushable wipes is the instigating culprit.

What can be done to indicate the quotes are the unstudied opinion of someone adversely affected by the fatbergs?

What can be done to inform readers of the significance of the difference between flushable and non flushable wipes? Richwierd2 (talk) 20:34, 8 June 2019 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Richwierd2 (talk • contribs) 20:29, 8 June 2019 (UTC)


 * "Flushable" may be a moving target ... after all, it it's in a sewer, the odds are that someone flushed it at some point. 82.1.7.156 (talk) 16:21, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

Possible source
https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2018/feb/04/fatberg-museum-london-display-pickling-age-waste

©Geni (talk) 17:44, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

Undue British focus
This article focuses unduly on England. Sure this phenomenon exists in other places as well? Hobbitschuster (talk) 21:21, 7 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes it does, however different sewage treatment and regulations in other countries often reduce the likelihood of a Fatberg to be created. Currently even the foreign language wikipedias mostly concentrate on the British cases.--Kmhkmh (talk) 23:22, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

Anti-fatberg NYC campaign
The government of New York City has launched an initiative against fatbergs at fatbergfree.nyc This should be mentioned in the article somewhere. --2601:8C:4500:4680:137:E155:1D9E:40BE (talk) 06:47, 7 March 2019 (UTC)

Saponification
A lot of the citations in this article are to newspapers and the like. There is an academic, technical literature on these issues that we could use more. I've added one citation. Note these use the jargon of "fat, oil, and grease (FOG) deposits" rather than the colloquialism "fatberg".

My understanding from this literature is that fatbergs are always the result of saponification of lipids. They're not just congealed fat. To harden into a fatberg requires saponification. But I may be wrong on that! I've made some edits to the article, but feel free to correct me if I've got this wrong. Bondegezou (talk) 10:49, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

"Fatburger (sewer)" listed at Redirects for discussion
A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Fatburger (sewer). The discussion will occur at Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 July 13 until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Shhhnotsoloud (talk) 12:24, 13 July 2021 (UTC)

"Fatburger (drain obstruction)" listed at Redirects for discussion
A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Fatburger (drain obstruction). The discussion will occur at Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 July 13 until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Shhhnotsoloud (talk) 12:27, 13 July 2021 (UTC)

misleading size comparison
the article lists several notable cases of drain obstructions and (probably citing attention-grabbing news headlines) describes them as "the size of a..." and here comes some object like bus, elephants, bungallow, etc. If the blockage is formed inside the drain pipes, its dimensions are likely following that of the pipes themselves, eg they are not "berg", "mountain", "bus", "elephant", "bungallow" -like in any dimension, even if the long and continuous block can reach the weight of the listed items. Since the length and weight of the blocking mass are more objectively informing of the dimensions of the blockage, I would rather suggest removing the undue comparisons to objects that would not fit a sewer tube. Also, more details describing the physical properties (i belive "hard as concrete" was somewhere mentioned - perhaps an exaggeration) and the reasons of why it is difficult to remove the blockage would be useful. 92.221.117.18 (talk) 21:04, 23 November 2022 (UTC).