Everyone knows that one person’s trash is another’s treasure. When the City of Calgary begins its “biocell” collaboration with University of Calgary researchers later this year, it will be combing through garbage to find just the right junk to create the most cultivated methane-producing landfill in the world. 

A global first in environmental engineering, the biocell is an isolated one-hectare pit in a 50-hectare landfill in southeast Calgary. It is lined with clay and plastic, filled with dry waste like broken bicycles, soaked with special leachate, sealed with a plastic cover and connected to pipes that vacuum out the methane gas produced. 

The point? To capture energy, reduce methane emissions into the air and reduce the footprint of traditional landfills. 

Landfills account for more than 30 percent of Canada’s human activity-related emissions of methane, which is 23 times more potent than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas. The biocell will also treat about three times more garbage in less space. And it leaves behind uncontaminated land that can be used for other things, such as housing. 

“We are the only researchers in the world doing this from scratch,” says Patrick Hettiaratchi, the U of C’s Schulich School of Engineering professor leading the project. Since 2005, Hettiaratchi’s team has been collecting data to understand exactly what is going on inside the cell so they can optimize its design. Tennis balls, for example, take too long to rot. 

Omar Hurtado, originally from Colombia, is one of several doctoral students attracted to the project. “We are passionate about improving conditions for humanity and it is empowering to know you can be one of the people instigating change,” he says.

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