The new biodigester belonging to Georgian Bluffs and Chatsworth can finally begin generating electricity for the grid.
It was opened in a ceremony a little more than a month ago — but Georgian Bluffs Mayor Alan Barfoot says final approval was received on Wednesday.
It came in the form of a certificate of approval issued by the Ontario Ministry of the Environment.
The biodigester has been accepting organic material like septage and agricultural waste since early in November.
The pathogens are being removed from the material, which can then be put back into the soil, but the methane gas that is garnered by the process can be used to operate a generator.
It can produce up to 24 hundred kilowatt hours of electricity per day and, theoretically, the production could begin today now that the approvals are all in place.
Barfoot says it won’t happen quite that quickly, and he can’t say just when it will happen, but final connection to the grid is imminent.
The 3.8 million dollar facility — located south of Kilsyth in Georgian Bluffs — is jointly owned by that municipality and Chatsworth.
They built it after receiving a funding commitment last year from a federal-provincial infrastructure program.
