Hawkesbury Landfill Gas Upgrade Project

The Hawkesbury Landfill Gas Upgrade Project is a waste sector project located at the Hawkesbury City Waste Management Facility on The Driftway in South Windsor, NSW. Situated approximately 5 kilometres south of the historic town of Windsor and 50 kilometres northwest of the Sydney CBD, the facility operates within the Hawkesbury Local Government Area. The project was registered in March 2022 and is managed by LGI Limited in partnership with the Hawkesbury City Council.

Operating under the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative, Landfill Gas) Methodology Determination 2015, the project focuses on upgrading the existing landfill gas collection system. Landfill gas projects involve capturing methane, a potent greenhouse gas generated by decomposing organic waste, and combusting it via a flaring system or generator. This combustion process converts methane into carbon dioxide, which has a significantly lower global warming potential. Specifically, this project is classified as an "upgrade" activity, meaning it installs new infrastructure (such as vertical extraction wells and a specialized LGI 500 biogas flare) to capture gas more efficiently than the site's historical or regulatory baseline.

The South Windsor region lies within the Cumberland Plain of the Sydney Basin, an area characterized by warm, temperate conditions and moderate rainfall averaging 700–800mm annually. The local landscape is a mix of peri-urban development, light industry, and semi-rural land used for grazing and turf farming. The soils in this immediate vicinity are typically alluvial loams and clays, owing to the site's proximity to Rickaby's Creek and the Hawkesbury River system.

A key feature of this project is its contribution to the Hawkesbury City Council's goal of achieving Net Zero emissions by 2030. Public reports indicate the landfill had a regulatory baseline of 38.5%, meaning the project earns Australian Carbon Credit Units (ACCUs) only for abatement achieved above this threshold. LGI Limited has highlighted that the project captures gas from both legacy (waste deposited before July 2012) and non-legacy waste, creating a commercially viable abatement stream that removes the equivalent of thousands of cars from the road annually.