Interview with EarthTek’s Keegan Gardner on the state of grease trap services in North Texas.
EarthTek, LLC
From Fryer to Fuel: How EarthTek Keeps DFW’s Grease in Check A conversation with EarthTek’s President about grease traps, liquid waste, and what really happens to all that brown grease and used cooking oil in North Texas.
Keegan Gardner President
Feb-26
Industrial Solutions
Overview
If you run a kitchen in DFW, there’s a good chance your waste grease has passed through one of Keegan Gardner’s trucks or processing sites. As General Manager at EarthTek , the industrial servicing company’s hauling arm, Keegan and his team keep restaurants, schools, cities, and other facilities flowing by pumping and hauling grease, grit, sand, and lint out of traps before they become expensive emergencies. From grease trap collection and transportation to recycling and disposal, EarthTek specializes in the “messy middle” between your drains and the city’s infrastructure. This Q&A pulls back the curtain on how Keegan thinks about fats, oils, and grease (“FOG”), why used cooking oil matters for both compliance and sustainability, and what every kitchen should know about the “invisible infrastructure” under their feet.
Keegan Gardner President
Biography:
• Prior to President, served as GM since Company’s foundation in 2010. • Oversees fleet optimization, staffing, B2B account support and asset management.
• Earned his MSW Class B license in 2017.
• Earned a B.S. in Economics from the University of Texas at Arlington.
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Industrial Solutions
A Conversation with Keegan Gardner
Q1. How do you explain your job to someone who’s never thought about grease traps? Keegan: I usually start by saying I work in waste management, and sometimes people joke that means I’m in the mob.
Third, we like to be as helpful as possible to our customer, taking note of their needs. To do that, we work in the dead of night, early mornings, or weekends. However, we can best service our local businesses so they can operate smoothly.
What I really do is keep two groups of people happy at the same time:
Our customers: Restaurants, hotels, universities, car washes. The folks who need everything to drain, not smell, and pass inspection.
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▪ Our cities. The local governments and other agencies trying to keep fats, oils, and grease out of the sewer so pipes, lift stations, and treatment plants can actually do their job. Day to day, that means scheduling and doing grease, sand, and lint trap service, managing a fleet of vacuum trucks, and working with our processing partners so the waste is handled in a way that’s safe and compliant. Q2. What makes EarthTek’s approach to grease trap servicing different? Keegan: A lot of operators see grease trap service as a checkbox. Our view is it’s closer to infrastructure. First, we focus on doing a complete pump-out, not just skimming the top of the trap. That helps prevent the “surprise overflow” that happens when sludge builds up at the bottom. Second, we pair trap service with preventative hydrojetting where it makes sense. High-pressure jetting is used to keep lines open and give our customers more breathing room before service. Not something need daily.
Q3. Where does all that grease and used cooking oil actually go? Image: AT&T Stadium, a staple in Arlington, the city where EarthTek is headquartered.
Keegan: Well… it doesn’t just vanish.
We typically haul liquid waste to a dedicated processing facility, like LiquiTek, or another approved facility, where wastewater is dewatered and the fats, oils, and grease are separated out. From there, it ends up in gravity boxes or other equipment, and the cleaner water goes back into the sewer system under permit. Yellow grease, often called used cooking oil, which is leftover from the fryers at restaurants, can be routed into biofuel supply chains or other recycling pathways, depending on regulations. Otherwise, we’ll work with the city to ensure it’s properly disposed at regulated landfills if that’s the only compliant option. And that’s the type of hauler we are and like to continue to evolve into: one that can best process your “waste.”
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Industrial Solutions
A Conversation with Keegan Gardner
Q4. What are the most common mistakes you see kitchens make with FOG?
Q5. How do you see regulations and sustainability evolving in the next few years? Keegan: Cities are taking FOG more seriously every year. Part of that is protecting pipes and plants, and part of it is realizing there’s value in these waste streams. We’re also seeing more focus on end-to-end documentation. For instance, where did it go, who handled it, and when. We are finding that more restaurants and third- party coordinators are wanting to ensure disposal is handled properly and that companies like ours will stand by them if there’s a problem.
Keegan: There are a few patterns we see, unfortunately:
1. Treating the trap like a storage tank. Letting traps go too long between services is the fastest way to back-ups and fines. Local guidelines and BMPs usually recommend service when a trap is 25% full, but many kitchens don’t track that until something smells off—or overflows. 2. No clear plan for used cooking oil. Used fryer oil that gets dumped down drains or into storm inlets is a huge problem. It should be collected in dedicated containers, kept separate from grease trap waste, and picked up by properly permitted haulers so everything stays in compliance and is easier to recycle. 3. No one “owns” FOG in the operation. I get that it’s not the most glamorous role in the kitchen, but it’s certainly important. The best-run kitchens have a single person responsible for grease traps, liquid waste manifests, and used cooking oil pickups. And we love working with those guys.
Q6. How do you see AI and technology impacting your industry?
Keegan: We’re trying not to turn EarthTek into a tech company, but we are trying to run a tighter shop. Our home office is switching over to a new ERP system led by one of our own, Sean Henggeler . He’s been digging into how we can automate some of the paperwork, routing, and reporting so drivers (and me) can be more efficient.
Proudly serving customers located across the following cities:
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Industrial Solutions
A Conversation with Keegan Gardner
They’re not out there for attention. They want solid equipment, clear plans, and to go home knowing the job was done right. My job is to support that and stay out of their way when they’re doing what they do best.
Q8. How do you stack up against the big national players in this space?
Keegan: Companies like Restaurant Technologies and Darling Ingredients are big operations. They cover a lot of ground and do a lot of things at scale. Although competitors, they are helping this industry keep its reputation, so we certainly tip our caps to those teams, as we pass by them on the road For us, we’re not trying to be the biggest. But we are trying to be the best in North Texas as this metroplex is massive and constantly evolving. And we like to think we know every nook of these backlots. Also, regional and privately held lets us move faster: you see the same people on your route, you can get a decision-maker on the phone, and we can adjust service around how your operation really runs instead of a national template. The ownership is not only invested in the company, but also heavily involved, which makes it mean a bit more. With EarthTek, LiquiTek, and soon YeloTek, we still get some of the advantages of scale—control of hauling, processing, and fuel—but we keep it tight and local. That’s usually where we win: responsiveness, consistency, and a clear line of sight from the trap to where that material ends up.
We’re also talking to peers and evaluating some OCR scanning capabilities, given the amount of manual manifests the work requires. And, simple tools that keep information flowing between the office, the plant, the trucks, and the customer. We wouldn’t call ourselves AI experts, but we’ve got a young team, that if a tool can help take some friction out of the job and give our people back an hour of their day – all while ensuring the customer is happy – we’re interested.
Q7. What should people know about the crews doing this work every day?
Keegan: They do a hard job well and they don’t make a big deal out of it.
Most days start early, in whatever weather we get. They’re backing trucks into tight alleys, working around hot kitchens and tight schedules, dragging hose and running equipment, then leaving the site looking like we were never there. A lot of our drivers come in with five-plus years of CDL experience. We’re always looking at how to build a path for people who want to learn this trade, but we don’t lower the bar on safety or quality.
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Industrial Solutions
A Conversation with Keegan Gardner
Q9. Anything you’re looking forward to in 2026?
From the trap, to the truck, to processing, and eventually into fuel, we’ll have more control end-to-end. It should make next year a good one for our crews, our partners, and the communities that are going to see more of what these guys can do. A lot more work to do, but it’s an exciting time for this industry.
Keegan: Definitely.
One thing I’m excited about is putting more structure around the disaster-relief work we’ve started. We’ve had a few emergency projects recently—one in Arkansas, one in Florida—where the team put in some long nights on big, messy jobs. We get the call, load up the RV, get to the site as quickly and safely as we can, and start figuring out how to clean things up so people can reopen. A big part of making that work has been the local subcontractors we partner with. In both states we found crews who fit right into how we operate -- show up, work hard, and think creatively. Overall, just good Southern relationships. When people like that help us get the job done, we remember those names for a long time. In 2026, we want to make this a more formal part of what we do. Sid Henggeler has really been driving that effort -- making sure our equipment, paperwork, and people are lined up at home so when the call comes in, we can roll without creating issues back here. On top of that, we’ve been quietly building a yellow grease processing facility in Arlington, near the Kennedale border, that we’re aiming to open in Q1. It’s a big step because it lets us handle even more of the process ourselves. We went out and recruited Diego Taverna to help lead that project, and he’s been a huge help this past year bringing more industry insight into the group.
YeloTek’s Recycling Process
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UCO produced
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EarthTek hauls UCO
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YeloTek receives UCO
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UCO processed
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Eco-friendly fuel
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February 2026
EarthTek
keegan@earthtek.biz linkedin.com/company/grease-trap-experts/ (817) 652-2780
(817) 919-9859
earthtek.biz Arlington, TX
EarthTek, LLC
Industrial Solutions
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