The household waste tracking system will give waste management services the ability to catalog the net weight of waste in a particular waste bin at the curbside during the typical residential trash truck pick up service. Simultaneously, the system will identify the type of bin, categorizing the type of waste (landfill, recycling, compost, etc.) and then tie that waste with a specific customer and location. This data will then be sent to a database where a company can relay, store, and convey that information as they see fit. Ideally, this system will have as little impact on the current trash collection process as possible, as to alleviate the waste-management service workers and household customer of any additional responsibilities.
The most basic design requirement of the system is simplicity. A system that is capable of generating and collecting this magnitude of data will need to have a very simple implementation, so that waste management service worker will need to acquire little to no more skills in order to use the system. If the system is too complex or cumbersome, it runs the risk of becoming unpopular and ultimately misused. Accordingly, to attain the maximum simplicity, the system will need to be automated. An automated system naturally lends its self to a microcontroller-based design. Additionally, to simplify the design, the system must not modify the existing waste management protocols and service technique. This also means that the system must retrofit to existing waste management infrastructure, i.e. trash trucks. Likewise, the system must be either dependent on the truck as a power supply or power independent.
Household waste tracking system retro fitted to waste reception vehicle
As the primary function of the household waste tracking system, data accuracy and bin identification fidelity are of the upmost importance, as to minimize the risk of incurring extra costs on the users of the system, and ensure the most utility possible. If an inaccurate waste amount is recorded, the data collected the system will prevent waste-management services and local governments from providing the correct incentives for responsible wasting. Furthermore, if the identification of the bin is inaccurate or unidentifiable the waste-management service could end up losing money and the ultimate purpose of the system is defeated as the data will not be of any use. The household waste tracking system must have a weight tolerance of 84 grams. This tolerance is the average one-cent unit weight of waste management service; calculated using the average amount of waste produced by American households and the pricing average of waste management services (see appendix). Past this accuracy, differences in weight will have less than a cent’s worth of impact on waste management service fees.
Additionally, once data and identification is collected the system must be able to relay or save the data in a way this is useful for the customer, waste-management service, and local governments. This means that data cannot be lost, so it must either be transmitted from the device or stored so that it can be off located at a different time. The information gathered and transmitted by the system will also need to be displayed in a convenient way to provide the most use. Although the system will provide information that will help waste-management services optimize their routes, the data analysis aspects that enable these functions are not a part of the household waste tracking system and will be the responsibility of the management service. The main function of the household waste tracking system is summarized by the figure below.
Final top-level functions block diagram
Due to the logistical and financial restrictions of this project the system will need to be testing on a scaled model rather than a full sized trash truck. Accordingly, the system will need a few small modifications to fit the new project model. This means that the technique for weight measurement will need to be slightly modified form the full-scale implementation. Additionally, the power system of the prototype will need to be independent and most likely battery oriented. Another modification to the system that must be made, due to the scale of the prototype, is user feedback. Since the dumping processes of waste collection will not be automated in this project, the device will need to give feedback to the operator as to when and how to dump the waste in cooperation with data collection.
Instead of implementing a unique web service for the household waste tracking system, this implementation used two preexisting “Internet of things” platforms to perform the functions of the system. To pass information between the device and the web display, the system uses Dweet.io Dweet is great at storing small amounts of variables (including integers, float values, strings, and locations) for web enabled “things,”, because it only requires a simple Http post to store data. Once the data has been stored on Dweet, another “Internet of things” platform called Freeboard.io automatically gathers the information and displays it in a way that is simple for customers, waste management companies and local governments to use.
