ReWaste Odour Controls
We're committed to being a good neighbour for residents and businesses in Wollert. We want to hear from anyone who has any concerns about odours so we can investigate and take action if needed.
Our Aurora Treatment Plant at Wollert
We’ve been operating in the Wollert area for many years. Our Aurora Treatment Plant at 525 Craigieburn Road East in Wollert consists of:
- A sewage treatment facility to produce recycled water.
- A ReWaste facility that has been transforming organic food waste into renewable energy since 2017.
Find out more about our ReWaste facility.
Report an odour
We want to hear from you if you’re noticing odours as it can help us to pinpoint causes of the odours and take further action.
You can report these to us by email at [email protected] or by calling us on 1300 117 080 during business hours.
You can also report these to the Environment Protection Authority Victoria (EPA) odour pollution hotline on 1300 372 842 or by email to [email protected].
Useful information to report includes:
- Time and date the noticeable odour started and ended.
- Your location.
- Anything else you notice at the time.
Community Updates following odour concerns
July 2023 Community Update
Odour management improvements
Since May, we’ve been working closely with the EPA to put improvements in place to better manage odours. These include:
- Decreasing the amount of waste we receive, especially organic waste that can cause odours.
- Changing how we manage organic waste, including diluting it and reducing the amount stored onsite.
- Engaging independent odour surveyors to check for odours at our site and in the community.
- Setting up a new odour monitoring system to provide continuous data and information from the site.
- Installing a new biofilter that helps scrub odours generated by our digestate tank. This biofilter will be installed later this year.
We provided our final report on the implementation of our activities to EPA Victoria in June 2023.
May 2023 community update
We've taken action
Since our last update, we’ve continued to investigate the cause of odours and taken action. These actions are reducing odours:
- Decreasing the amount of waste we receive, reducing the amount of organic waste that can cause odours.
- Changing how we manage organic waste, including diluting it.
- Engaging independent odour surveyors to check for odours at our site and in the community.
- Setting up a new odour monitoring system, which we’ll put on site in June 2023.
- Keeping in contact with local development sales offices to understand any feedback they’ve received from people in the area.
Pollution improvement
These actions improve our existing odour controls. They also respond to the EPA’s Pollution Improvement Notice relating to odour issues that was issued in May 2022.
We gave the EPA an update in May and will provide a final report by 30 June 2023.
Further enhancements
We’re committed to further improving our odour controls for current and future communities in the area. We’ll install a new biofilter on our digestate tank to do this.
We’re doing work as quickly as possible to put these additional controls to be in place.
March 2023 community update
Our investigations into what’s causing odour
We’ve been undertaking investigations to establish the root cause of the odour, including:
- Carrying out odour investigations.
- Engaging odour surveyors to undertake ongoing odour assessments at our ReWaste site and out in the community (since 20 March).
- Planning to set up 24/7 odour monitoring, which will provide useful odour data in the long-term.
- Contacting nearby development sales offices to understand any feedback they’ve received from local residents.
We’re taking action
To reduce the likelihood of odours spreading beyond the 160-hectare established buffer zone at our Aurora Treatment Plant, we’re:
- Decreasing the amount of waste we receive to reduce the level of processed food stored in the tank.
- Exploring other interim measures such as further changes to how we treat and manage the processed food waste.
- Strengthening our odour controls by designing new controls for our digestate tank in the long-term.