Methane pipe breaks at Brady Road, preventing dump from flaring off all of its greenhouse gases

A pipe collecting methane below the City of Winnipeg's largest trash dump has busted, preventing the landfill from flaring off all of the harmful greenhouse gas.

In April, operators of the methane-flaring facility at the Brady Road Landfill discovered a portion of their underground pipeline wasn't working efficiently, water and waste officials informed city council in a report.

Officials determined a portion of the pipe was damaged and shut it down, but the reduced flow of gas has prevented the city from flaring off all of its methane, which is far more effective than carbon dioxide at trapping heat in the atmosphere.

Right now, three of the 63 wells are offline, said Randy Park, Winnipeg's actingsolid waste manager.

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The pipe is buried 10 metres below ground and cannot be fixed, city officials say. The city now plans to replace the pipe at a cost of $150,000 as part of an urgent fix. Right

Brady Road managersmay alter the way theyallowheavy machinery to move about the landfill in the future to prevent further breaks. They also plan to map out the location of the pipeline more explicitly.

"Failures in the piping infrastructure may be caused by a number of factors, including natural landfill settlement, excavation near the pipe network or excessive amounts of heavy equipment traffic directly over the area," water and waste officials noted in their report.

The city plans to transfer the cash over from a fund devoted to drainage projects and road repairs at the landfill.

The city started capturing methane at its sprawling garbage dumpand flaring off the gas in 2013, both to reduce odours emanating from the landfilland reduce greenhouse-gas emissions.

Methane, produced byorganic waste as it rots underground, is far more potent as a greenhouse gas thanthe carbon dioxide produced by flaring.

The city installed 42 gas wells in the landfill in 2013, 21morein 2017 and plans to extend the pipes next yearas part of a $4-million methane-capture expansion.