The City of Edmonton, Alberta will be home to the world's first industrial scale facility to produce biofuels from municipal solid waste, according to a press release from the city government. The Canadian energy capital said it has signed a 25-year agreement with two local energy companies to produce a $70 million (CND) biofuels facility. The planned facility will initially produce 36 million liters of biofuels per year and reduce the province’s CO₂ footprint by more than 6 million tonnes over the next 25 years, according to estimates.

The agreement was signed between the city; GreenField Ethanol, Canada's largest ethanol producer; and Enerkem, a biofuels technology company.

The city and the provincial government, through the Alberta Energy Research Institute (AERI), are contributing $20 million to the facility. The city will also contribute $50 million to a related processing facility and research facility.

"This new facility will be a first for both the biofuels and waste management industries. This is the world's first agreement signed between a large urban centre and a biofuel producer to turn municipal waste into ethanol," said Vincent Chornet, Enerken president and CEO.

"This next generation biofuels facility will offer drivers a new choice in transportation fuels," said Donald Pierce, president of Greenfield Ethanol's Advanced Biofuels Group.