B.C. city says it spent $600K on tech it hoped would abate sewage odours

In a small B.C. Interior city surrounded by trees, a strong odour overpowers the fresh mountain air.

“Periodically, it would smell kind of like a farm,” said Castlegar, B.C., resident Elisha Del Col. "A very strong scent. It’s awful."

The smell, she said, has been a problem for years.

“Summer is worse than the winter. It’s the warmer season when it’s a stronger odour. Winter not as much.”

It comes from the South Sewage Treatment Plant situated along the Columbia River.

“Unfortunately it's a sewage treatment plant in the middle of a neighbourhood, which, as you can imagine, would exacerbate our problems,” said Chris Hallam, Castlegar’s director of municipal services.

In an effort to mitigate the stink, the city spent $600,000 to install new technology — called geotubes — that was expe