Diverting food waste
biovator
From waste to soil
composting
The BIOvator is our newest sustainability project.
Our 20-foot in-vessel composter uses trillions of microbes and bacteria to digest organic waste and create a nutrient-rich compost to use as top-dressing and soil amendment.
Once we master the art, our unit will be able process up to 1,230 lbs of food waste each week.
Did you know?
One pound of food waste in the landfill emits 3.8 lbs of greenhouse gases.
Quick Facts
cnsc waste
During busy seasons, we collect up to 60 lbs of food waste (like kitchen scraps and coffee grounds) per week.
no meat or dairy
Eventually we will collect a wider variety of organic waste, but we're not accepting meat or dairy while we optimize our system.
office paper
Most of our office paper gets composted in our system, plus a significant amount of cardboard.
wood source
We harvest our local wood source locally by trimming willows around the Centre. We dry it, chip it down, and turn it into our composter's carbon source. This also provides a source of nitrogen, which is important to the composting process.
quality control
Weekly quality control takes anywhere from 3 to 6 hours. Extra time is often needed when input includes contaminants like stickers or plastic wrapping.
since October 2025, we have diverted
get involved
Composting in the subarctic isn’t easy—but it makes a big impact. By supporting our Biovator program, you’re helping turn food scraps into soil, keep waste out of landfills, and reduce the risk of attracting polar bears into town.
Together, we can turn waste into growth and problems into solutions.
More About the initiative
Where we are
We are still in our start up phase, so to keep things manageable for staff, we are collecting weekly food waste from our Launchbox subscribers only.
On average, we collect 30 lbs of waste per week, so we are already helping to divert up to 114 lbs of greenhouse gas emissions from the landfill every week.
We are on track to divert 18,700 lbs of food waste from our landfill annually, preventing over an estimated two metric tons of carbon emissions.
Why it matters
For a subarctic research centre focused on the environment, this initiative is a no-brainer.
But composting here isn’t just about soil—it’s about safety too.
After a fire damaged Churchill’s indoor waste storage facility in April 2025, organic waste became harder to manage and more likely to attract unwanted attention from polar bears.
By diverting food waste through our Biovator composter, we’re not only lowering our carbon footprint, we’re also helping protect both the town and the wildlife that surrounds us.
Where we started
The CNSC has been composting for years using a large static metal container stored behind the centre.
The long term vision has always been to build a system capable of eventually handling food waste from the wider community once fully established, which we were able to begin realizing with support from the Northern Manitoba Food Culture and Community Collaborative, and the Government.
Where we're headed
As we grow and refine our program, we plan to expand by collecting food waste from local restaurants and opening the program up to additional community members.
This phase will help us assess the effectiveness of our methods and make any necessary adjustments.
Our goal is to be operating at full capacity by fall 2027, processing between 400 and 600 lbs of food waste per week.