Calgary has decided to boldly go where other cities began going 30 years ago.

Last week city council gave the green light for green waste bins to join now ubiquitous black and blue carts in a pilot compost project.

Beginning in March 2012, 7,500 households will receive carts in which to toss food and yard waste. Surveys conducted for a city report on food and yard waste found 83 per cent support for a compostable waste program such as this.

Blair Riddle, spokesman for the city’s Waste and Recycling Services, says they are still assessing bids from companies eager to process the waste. That selection will determine what can be composted during the pilot. Riddle says the city would like a plant that can process meat and dairy, but poop is still up in the air.

Riddle says the city has been subsidizing the purchase of backyard compost bins for a number of years, but research showed 60 per cent of compostable waste was still going to the dump.

‘In order to really make a big impact to divert that material from landfills, you have to make it more convenient and accessible, and allow a broader range of materials than people can currently compost in the backyard.”

The benefits are a reduction in methane gas (which forms in greater volumes in landfills than compost), longer life-spans for landfills, and lots of dirt for Calgarians.

‘The long-range plan is that what’s produced is a marketable product,” says Riddle.

Calgary’s current Waste and Recycling budget is approximately $125 million. Once the composting facility is built the compost program is anticipated to cost between $15 million and $19 million. If all goes well with the pilot, roadside compost pick up will go city-wide between 2015 and 2017.