Ballarat Landfill Gas Project

Ballarat Landfill Gas Project is an electricity generation from landfill gas project located at the Ballarat Regional Landfill in Smythesdale, approximately 20km southwest of Ballarat in Victoria. It was registered in February 2013. The exact project area size is unspecified, which is a standard characteristic for facility-based emissions reduction projects.

Electricity generation from landfill gas projects involve capturing methane, a highly potent greenhouse gas produced by decomposing organic waste, and combusting it in a generator to produce renewable electricity. The methodology requires the ongoing operation of a landfill gas collection system to continuously extract and destroy methane before it can be released into the atmosphere, directly displacing fossil-fuel energy on the electricity grid.

The Smythesdale and broader Central Highlands region is known for agricultural land uses such as sheep and cattle grazing, alongside forestry and historical gold mining operations. The area experiences a temperate climate with moderate, reliable rainfall, historically averaging around 686 mm annually. Local soils are typically characterised by basalt-derived volcanic clays, ferrosols, and sedimentary clay loams.

The facility is operated by LMS Energy Pty Ltd in partnership with the City of Ballarat. It actively captures and combusts gas generated at the landfill from both legacy and non-legacy waste. Over its lifetime, the project has adapted to evolving regulatory standards, transitioning from a revoked legacy waste method to the 2015 methodology, and ultimately varying to the 2021 Electricity Generation determination in February 2022. Additionally, the project was supported by a long-term Carbon Abatement Contract (CAC362004) awarded in February 2013, which committed a large volume of abatement across several of LMS Energy's sites and successfully reached completion in April 2022. This project continues to play an important role in the local council's climate action strategy by converting municipal waste emissions into usable renewable power.