City of Ballarat mayor Des Hudson confirmed the service will be available for only a cross section of single dwelling properties across the city, but said future inclusion of smaller residential buildings isn’t out of the question after the initial 12-month roll-out phase.

Cr Hudson said the decision to initially leave out smaller residential properties, aside from reducing waste to landfill, was partly to limit the cost of the roll-out.

“I guess it’s (the decision) about those detached houses with bigger gardens with more clippings,” Cr Hudson said.

“But also rolling out the system to make it cost effective for council.

“Lets embed this practice first and get it right.”

In contrast, City of Greater Bendigo mayor Rod Fyffe said dwellings such as townhouses and apartments had been included in the Bendigo green bin trial to great effect.

The trial started with 2800 homes across Bendigo from September 10 last year, with Cr Fyffe describing the inclusion of smaller dwellings as “important”.

“Everyone creates organic waste,” he said.

“It’s the organic waste that creates carbon dioxide.

“Certainly around the university, we’ve got some concentration of (high density residential) housing and for them to know that they’ve got the option (of using a green waste system) is pretty good.”

A letter sent from council to non-eligible Ballarat residents last week explained the decision not to include smaller properties.

"The service will be provided to all residential properties with a detached house (including houses with granny flats and bungalows) on land between 250 (square) metres and 4000 (square) metres in Ballarat, Buninyong, Learmonth and Miners Rest," the letter read.

"Green waste can still be taken to (the) City of Ballarat Transfer Station at Gillies Street South.”

Ballarat’s green waste service is due to begin in July.