HARRISBURG (TNS) — Talk about dumpster diving.

But if there was half a billion dollars on the line, you might be eyeballs deep in garbage too.

For the past decade, James Howells, a Welsh IT engineer, has been involved in a legal battle with the Newport City Council to recover a hard drive containing 8,000 Bitcoins worth an estimated $500 million at its highest peak, according to Wales Online.

This all happened because Howells mistakenly threw away the hard drive the Bitcoins were stored on in 2013. By the time he realized his horrible error, the trash had already been taken to the landfill.

When Howells intended to search for the landfill, he was stopped by authorities. The city council denied his requests also, citing environmental concerns and the logistical challenges of what would be a massive excavation.

According to the city council, such a scavenger hunt would take about three years to search through and another year to put everything back. The cost of the search hasn’t even been factored in, which the city equated to $13 million.

Even though Howells claims to have secured private funding to cover that cost and is willing to pay the city $50 million for the work as a finders fee, the city still told him no.

As a result, Howells is taking the entire ordeal to court and is seeking $647 million. The case is set for December.