Work underway on expanding Calgary's composting facility

Dignitaries gathered Monday for a ceremonial groundbreaking marking the expansion of Calgary's composting facility.

Naturally, they dug their shovels into some fresh compost for the occasion.

The $89.6 million build-out will increase the facility's capacity by 60 per cent.

The expansion will include new technology including an anaerobic digestion system which will boost its ability to process more organic material. The new addition will also be able to generate and capture biogas to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The existing facility opened in 2017 as the City of Calgary rolled out its green cart program for the curbside recycling of organic materials.

But the popularity of the program meant the plant reached its capacity years ahead of schedule. As a result, planning work on the expansion started a couple of years ago.

A manager with the city's infrastructure services department, Tanner Fellinger, said it will allow the city to accommodate the flow of materials coming in from Calgarians.

"The expansion itself was the result of the uptake on the green cart program and how successful that program has been. The expansion's meant to get us through the next several years," he said.

As for the expansion being built next to the existing composting facility, which is located at the Shepard landfill in the city's southeast, Fellinger said it's a good fit.

"From a technical perspective, I think just having this existing facility here already helps us with processing all of the volumes that we're seeing. So it just made sense that the expansion stayed at this facility because there were a lot of things already in place in part of the operational infrastructure that we could utilize and continue to build upon."

Making it happen

Due to escalating costs related to inflation, city council approved additional money for the project in last November's budget debate.

It was originally slated to cost $50 million.

The city is getting some help with the costs of the project.

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities is assisting with $23 million from its green municipal fund, and the government of Canada are providing $10.7 million through the low carbon economy fund.

Some of the money has come in the form of grants; another portion from loans that give the the city access to lower interest rates.

Mayor Jyoti Gondek said it's important for the city to leverage support from other funding sources.

"It's really difficult to do things like this on our own as a municipality because our funding sources are so limited," said Gondek.

"To have good partners that were willing to come forward with funds really did make this happen."

Construction on the project has already started and the city says the expansion will be completed by the end of 2025.