Smart trash bin monitoring system

Project description

This product is used in trash bin to monitor the garbage. It can indicate the level of garbage by the ultrasonic sensor and represent with 3 colors (red, orange and green) in the smartphone. Each color stands for different garbage level. More led lights up, higher garbage level it reaches.  Green light turns on when it reaches under 20% full of trash bin. Green and orange lights turn on when it reach a level in 20% to 60% full. All three lights turn on when trash bin reach 60% or higher. The system will connect with wifi so user can check the garbage level with smartphone connected with internet everywhere.

Objective

This product can help the garbage collecting team of society or buildings. Using the mobile app, they can read the garbage level of the bins. Therefore, they can collect the garbage when it is necessary. Also it can adjust the time to collect the garbage by tracking the data. They can know how long does it take to full in average. It increases the efficiency of collecting garbage. 

Data analysis

For the distance measured by the ultrasonic sensor, we get 25cm when there is no garbage. So we set the green light on when the distance between the garbage and sensor is less than 25 but larger than 20 (20% full of trash bin). Orange light on when the distance between the garbage and sensor is less than 20 but larger than 10 (60% full of trash bin). Red light on when the distance between the garbage and sensor is less than 10.

Distance measured by sensor n(cm)	Green light	Orange light	Red light
n<10	On	On	On
10<=n<20	On	On	Off
20<=n<25	On	Off	Off

20<=n<25

10<=n<20 

        n<10 

Discussion

We choose ultrasonic sensor as measuring the distance is the easiest way to detect the garbage level. When there is lots of garbage, the garbage must stack higher. So the distance can reflect the garbage level. Of course, the garbage usually not placed eventually. It will affect the highest height of the garbage, but most of the cases will not be affected so much.

As the trash bin is stationary, a wifi connection is stable for the system. So we decided to use wifi instead of other communication method.