CQU has a seminal and ongoing role in $2.26 million of research into capping landfills with soil and trees instead of clay (which is more expensive).

And the nationally-significant project will draw on Rockhampton\'s city dump landfill as one of its case studies.

CQU Plant Sciences researcher Dr Nanjappa Ashwath said a collaborative project with the University of Melbourne has been approved.

The Australian Research Council Linkage program has approved $734,000 over six years and the Waste Management Association of Australia is contributing $1,526,000 (cash and in-kind).

Landfills remain the main method of waste disposal in Australia and are a major source of groundwater contamination and greenhouse and odour emissions.

This national research program will establish, under a wide range of Australian conditions, whether landfill phytocaps can meet regulatory performance criteria for water infiltration into and gas emissions from closed landfills more effectively, efficiently and sustainably than conventional capping systems.

The project will produce a scientific basis for site owners and regulators to agree on the performance and cost of conventional and phyto-cover technologies, a manual for the design and permitting of alternative covers, and improved scientific prediction of cover performance. \"This project will help extend the experiments that we are currently undertaking at Rockhampton City Council to other states and cities,\" Dr Ashwath said.

\"Richard Yeates and Roger Stuart (Directors, Phytolink Aust Pty Ltd; Brisbane) who have been collaborating with us for the past five years have been instrumental in initiating this project.

\"The initial funding assistance of Brisbane City Council, Rockhampton City Council, Noosa Council and AusIndustry enabled us to gather basic data that was necessary to convince the industry and the governments to fund this project.

\"The demonstration plots that the CQU Plant Sciences Group has established on the landfills, especially the ones on Rockhampton landfill (with the support of Mayor Margaret Strelow and the waste services Manager Craig Dunglison), and the workshops that the US scientists presented (again organised by Richard and Roger) helped immensely in securing this fund.\".

Phytocapping (use of soil and plants as store and pump, respectively, of rainwater) is a novel technology that has a potential to replace the EPA-prescribed clay capping at about half the cost.

The application of this technology will be trialled in various agroclimatic conditions within Australia, with the view to recommending this technology (if proven) to regulatory authorities, as an alternative capping system for landfill remediation.

The world-renowned scientist Professor Alan Baker and the environmental engineer Dr Sam Yuen will be leading the project, with Mr Richard Yeates as the program manager.