Pauingassi First Nation Landfill Expansion

Pauingassi First Nation is located in eastern Manitoba, approximately 275 km northeast of Winnipeg, on a peninsula of land that extends southward into Fishing Lake. The community has a total registered population of 668 and does not have an airport or an all-season road for access and uses winter roads, float planes or helicopters depending on the time of year.

Because access is primarily by winter road, numerous challenges must be overcome for solid waste management and in general for any construction projects in the community. Some of these challenges include heavy equipment access; difficulty removing divertible wastes from the community to proper disposal depots; dependency (and variability) of ice thickness; and overall higher construction costs compared to other, more easily accessible communities.

KGS Group created a new integrated resource management centre for this remote community. Success was achieved even though the COVID-19 pandemic and 2021 forest fires impacted the schedule. An innovative design overcame challenging site conditions, integrated community requests, preserved local heritage resources and Traditional Land Use Areas, and mitigated existing environmental impacts.

The result is a practical, environmentally sound, sustainable and aesthetically pleasing waste management facility that also addresses waste diversion. This project is a model for successful collaboration between Indigenous communities, contractors, consulting companies and government agencies.