Wyong Landfill Gas Project

Wyong Landfill Gas Project is a landfill gas electricity generation project located at the Buttonderry Waste Management Facility in Jilliby, approximately 12km northwest of Wyong on the Central Coast of New South Wales. Registered in November 2012, the project operates within the confines of a major municipal waste facility. While the immediate project area is dedicated to waste management, the surrounding Jilliby area is characterised by rural residential properties, poultry farming, grazing, and state forest bushland.

Electricity generation from landfill gas projects involves the installation and operation of a system to collect methane generated by the anaerobic decomposition of legacy and non-legacy waste. Instead of being released into the atmosphere, this captured biogas is combusted in a generator to produce renewable electricity. The methodology requires project proponents to calculate the quantity or energy content of the gas sent to a combustion device. By doing so, the project earns carbon credits (ACCUs) for both the destruction of methane, a highly potent greenhouse gas, and the displacement of fossil-fuel-based grid energy.

The Central Coast region of New South Wales is classified as a high rainfall zone, receiving an average of approximately 970mm of precipitation annually. The local terrain sits on Patonga Claystone formations, typically resulting in clay and loam soils that can be erodible and are often interspersed with sandstone boulders.

The project operates under the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative, Electricity Generation from Landfill Gas) Methodology Determination 2021. LMS Energy Pty Ltd serves as the project proponent and operates the gas collection and generation infrastructure, while the site itself is owned by the Central Coast Council. The site's Buttonderry Bioenergy Facility currently has an installed capacity of 2.2MW. Over its lifetime, this project has successfully transitioned through multiple regulatory frameworks, moving from the original revoked 'CFI' legacy waste method, to the 2015 determination, and finally to the 2021 electricity generation method. Furthermore, the project previously held a fixed-delivery carbon abatement contract (CAC783640) with the Australian Government, which was contracted in April 2015 and completed successfully in April 2022 after delivering over 1.5 million tonnes of abatement.