At home in Venice, a family enjoys a plate of mouth-watering polenta e schie, a local delicacy of tiny shrimp on a bed of creamy polenta. In the kitchen a pan of cooking oil is cooling on the stove, as well as the shrimp; it has been used to fry calamari, chicken, and even French fries. Now it is time for a change. The used oil is poured carefully into a container where it awaits collection before beginning a new lifecycle as bio fuel.

It is part of a project by Eni, one of the world’s leading energy suppliers, who believe it is time to rethink our relationship with waste, including cooking oil. The single-use society that is exhausting our planet’s