BRENDA O’FARRELL
The 1019 Report
About 18 months after the MRC of Vaudreuil-Soulanges abruptly halted its plans to build a multi-million-dollar compost treatment facility in the face of unrelenting opposition from residents, the regional authority has unveiled its Plan B – the same facility in a new location. But the project will come with a significantly higher price tag.
“It’s the right site for this type of project,” said Alexandre Lambert, director-general of the MRC, in an interview with The 1019 Report last week.
The 23-member MRC council last month voted to purchase an 11-acre tract of land in the industrial park in Coteau du Lac at a cost of about $12.5 million to build its open-air plant to process compostable waste collected in the region. The move pushes the cost of the overall project – the largest ever tackled by the regional authority – to an estimated $34 million – roughly $14 million more than the original proposal that was rejected in November 2023.
But it is not quite a done deal yet.
The site, near the soon-to-be-closed Amazon distribution centre west of Route 201 and just north of Highway 20, still must be subdivided and undergo a zoning change, Lambert said, explaining that although zoned for industrial use, the specific activity of processing compost is not permitted. He expects the change will be approved by October, and the purchase of the land will be finalized in November.
See COMPOST, Page 4.
COMPOST: New site responds
to concerns raised by residents
From Page 1
Yesterday evening, the MRC held a public information session to outline the details of the plan with residents. But last week, Lambert shared some of the specifics with The 1019 Report.
“We heard the concerns of the citizens and their recommendation of using an industrial site,” Lambert said. “But that can come at a cost, and it is costing us more.”
The MRC’s original plan was to build the open-air compost facility on a wooded site that was roughly 17 acres in size in St. Télésphore. But that land was zoned for agricultural use, and residents in the town and neighbouring municipalities feared the runoff from the open-air platform could contaminate ground water, potentially jeopardizing the wells that provide clean water for their homes and surrounding farms.
The opposition was intense. Described by one resident at the time as the “most significant citizen opposition” in close to a decade, opponents from towns in the west end of the Vaudreuil-Soulanges region packed the MRC meetings. They urged MRC officials to find a more suitable location for the site.
Stephanie Côté, a spokesperson for the residents at that time, made it clear, the group was not against the construction of a facility, they merely opposed the proposed location in St. Télesphore.
But residents were not the only ones who were opposed to the original plan. Three municipal councils in the region – St. Polycarpe, Ste. Justine de Newton and Coteau du Lac – had adopted formal resolutions in October 2023 urging the MRC to reconsider its choice of locations for the plant.
Now, Lambert says, the choice of the new location responds to the concerns raised by residents. The new site in Coteau du Lac will be isolated, and all runoff from the platform will be collected and processed in a waste-water treatment plant already in service in the industrial park.
The MRC, like all MRCs in the province, have an obligation to treat composable waste. By operating its own facility instead of contracting a third party to provide the service, officials say the regional authority will be able to better manage costs over the long term.
The MRC currently collects about 14,000 tonnes of compostable material. The new facility, which is expected to be in operation by the spring of 2028, will have the capacity to process 24,000 tonnes per year, the projected need for the region when it begins collecting compostable waste from commercial and industrial operations in the region, including the new hospital in Vaudreuil-Dorion, Lambert said.