Ararat Organic Waste Treatment Facility

Ararat Organic Waste Treatment Facility is a waste diversion and treatment project located within the industrial precinct of Ararat, a major regional town in western Victoria, approximately 200km west of Melbourne. Registered in March 2024, the project operates on a specific industrial site rather than a broad agricultural area. The surrounding Ararat region is traditionally defined by sheep grazing, broadacre cropping, and viticulture, situated in the transition zone between the Western District plains and the Pyrenees ranges. The local climate is temperate to semi-arid with an average annual rainfall of approximately 580mm, and the landscape typically features clay-loam and basalt-derived soils.

The project operates under the Source Separated Organic Waste methodology, which generates carbon credits by diverting organic material, such as food and garden waste, away from landfills where it would otherwise decompose to release methane. Instead, the waste is separated at the point of generation (e.g., household FOGO bins) and processed in a specialized facility. The Ararat facility utilizes Gaia Envirotech’s modular "Rapid Composter" technology and anaerobic digestion systems. This setup accelerates the composting process using enclosed vessels to control temperature and pasteurization, treating the waste locally to reduce transport emissions ("waste miles") while producing nutrient-rich compost and biogas for destruction or energy generation.