In this study, crude glycerol from various industries was used to produce lipids via wild type Yarrowia lipolytica A101. We tested samples without any prior purification from five different waste products; each contained various concentrations of glycerol (42-87%) as the sole carbon source. The best results for lipid production were obtained for medium containing glycerol from fat saponification. This reached 1.69gL<SUP>-1</SUP> (25% of total cell dry weight) with a biomass yield of 0.17gg<SUP>-1</SUP> in the flasks experiment. The batch cultivation in a bioreactor resulted in enhanced lipid production-it achieved 4.72gL<SUP>-1</SUP> with a biomass yield 0.21gg<SUP>-1</SUP>. Moreover, the properly selected batch of crude glycerol provides a defined fatty acid composition. In summary, this paper shows that crude glycerol from soap production could be efficiently converted to single cell oil without any prior purification.