Compost hub would not stink out neighbours, Bendigo council told

Western Composting Technology wants to transform six hectares of Huntly land in a multi-million-dollar project hailed as a better way to deal with residents' food and organics waste.

Experts have been testing at the Wallenjoe Road site and say there is a low risk of noise or odour for nearby properties, the company has told the council.

Below: A map showing land the composting facility could be installed on:

The company wants waste trucked to the property next to Huntly's saleyards, where it would be shredded and placed in climate-controlled "vessels" to be pasteurised.

The compost would then be transferred to windrows to mature for up to 16 weeks.

The process would be similar to what Western Composting Technology already does in Shepparton, managing director Ken Dickens said in an interview with the Bendigo Advertiser.

"We've been operating that facility for 16 years and we've never had an odour issue," he said.

At that facility, odour is confined to tunnels with air only allowed to escape through a biofilter, Mr Dickens said.

"So it's world's best practice. We have people who come to our Sheparton site and tell us it's like nothing they've ever seen," he said.

"And the Bendigo one would be an upgrade on what we've got in Shepparton."

Western Composting Technology expects to process up to 30,000 tonnes of food and organic waste a year.

The company thinks the facility would fit in well for land set aside for industrial uses.

There are a handful of houses in the area but the composting facility was unlikely to impact people's sense of amenity, it told the council.

That was because it would be set back from people's homes in an area set aside for agriculture, the company said.

Winning planning permission would be a "ripper opportunity" both for Western Composting Technology and Bendigo residents, Mr Dickens told the Advertiser.

"For us its a great commercial opportunity but it's also something Bendigo ratepayers are going to be proud of," he said.

Bendigo's council wants to send at least 20,000 tonnes of green waste it collects each year to be composted, assuming the project meets planning requirements.

It would lease the site to Western Composting Technology under current plans.

Composting in Huntly could slash the city's emissions by 16.3 per cent because it would not have to cart that waste to a facility at Stanhope, the council has previously said.

The council is considering the planning application and is expected to make a decision at a later date.

It is one in a group of decision-makers who need to sign off on the plans before the project can proceed, including Environment Protection Authority Victoria.

Any compost created in Bendigo would be high quality, Mr Dickens said.

"We don't take anything other than kerbside food and green waste. That's it. We don't take grease-trap waste, volatiles or anything that impacts on the finished product," he said.

"We're probably the only group in Victoria that does that."