Press Release

Old Vegetable Oil Finds a Hot New Purpose

By: Annmarie Timmins
Date: June 25, 2008
Source: The Concord Monitor

If all goes as planned, a Pittsfield tannery that once produced leather alongside the Suncook River could soon become one of the greenest businesses around.

All thanks to vegetable oil.

Tony Giunta, Franklin's former mayor, and Sarandis Karathanasis, co-owner of Concord's Red Blazer Restaurant and Pub, have started a new business that will turn used vegetable oil into heat for homes and businesses.

The two will also supply restaurants with clean frying oil at reduced rates and then come back and pick up the used oil. At the Pittsfield site, they'll strip the used oil of water and food bits - a process that turns it into fuel - and then deliver it to customers who want it for their "veggie-oil" boilers.

With their company Amenico, Giunta and Karathanasis will also sell the boilers to home and business owners who want an alternative to propane and traditional heating oil. And one day, they hope to be helping people convert their cars to run on the used vegetable oil.

All of it will happen at the former home of Suncook Leather's tannery in Pittsfield, which Amenico is in the process of buying. Giunta and Karathanasis plan to be up and running by Aug. 1, Karathanasis said, and within months, create 25 jobs.

The project got a warm reception from the Pittsfield selectmen when they were briefed last month, said Town Administrator Leon Kenison. "Folks in Pittsfield have been trying to revitalize the economic health of the economy," he said. "And this could be the first brick in the foundation."