About Albury City
While the twin cities of Albury and Wodonga are separated
geographically by the Murray River and politically by a state
border, the region has developed a collaborative approach to
waste and resource recovery.
The Challenge
Albury City Council and the City of Wodonga teamed up with
Federation Council, the Shires of Towong, Greater Hume Indigo
and Alpine Shire Councils to launch Halve Waste. As the names
suggests, the initiative has a key focus – reducing the amount
of waste going to landfill by 50 per cent. Aer it was estimated
that the region’s landfills would be at capacity by 2050. “We
want to be empowered by data to drive new initiatives that
reduce general waste and single use plastics going into our
landfill” according to Imogen Schierle, Regional Partnerships
Innovation Coordinator Albury and Wodonga City Councils. She
adds that one of the key challenges for the region is working to
reduce waste in its public bins, while improving service delivery
for the community. “Our public waste practice was pre-defined
by routes based on historic planning and has proved not to be
eicient for council and in need of review.” “Albury City also
understands the role that waste has to play in aecting our micro
taoglas.com
CASE STUDY
Taoglas Waste Insights™
provides a data driven solution
helping Albury City in order to
achieve it’s landfill reduction
targets and reduce operational
costs.
city climate and our macro regional climate. However, to what
extent was previously unknown, we sought to uncover the facts
to drive change,” Schierle says.
The Solution
Taoglas Waste Insights™ hardware and soware solution is
used to collect valuable data to address urban, economic and
sustainability challenges, while also detecting incidents and
improving the health and safety of communities.
“The next step is to become more intuitive with commercial and
retail waste patterns to better predict events that cause increased
waste and the types of waste our city produces,” Schierle says.
Deploying Taoglas Waste Insights network in the city allows them
to take advantage of dynamic routing, planned collections and
most impactfully, predictive collection optimisation.
taoglas.com
For further information visit: www.taoglas.com/smart-waste/
Featured Taoglas Technologies
• 100 x NB-IoT enabled sensors
deployed in 2020/21
• 48 x NB-IoT enabled temperature sensors
deployed in 2021
• Navigation platform
On/O
By holding the
magnet at this
location the device
will beep 5 times and
turn itself on or o.
Optical Sensor
Two optical sensors
for accurate optical
measurements.
Cone Seal
The cone seal provides
an option for a cone to be
retrofitted for larger bin
vessels.
Ultrasonic Sensor
1 inch Ultrasonic sensor
reads the topology of the
waste in the bin.
Hardened Plastic
Enclosure
Hardened plastic enclosure
allows for robust installation
in harsh environments
including sea salt spray
locations, duty and dirty
locations and all weather
locations.
IP66 Rated
IP66 rating enables high
pressure washer cleaning.
The Outcome
With the implementation of over 100 Waste Insights sensors Albury
City has now developed their smart waste network to immediately
become more intuitive with commercial and retail waste patterns
allowing them to better predict events that cause increased waste
and the types of waste the city produces.
The Taoglas Waste Insights™ solution has provided
Albury City with
Reduction in collections
The Albury waste department was able to reduce collection
frequency, identify hot spots and bins with issues, maximise the
data collection of recycling volumes and reduce vehicle emissions.
Reduction in Operational Expenditure
Operational expenditure have reduced directly in line with the
costs of collecting bins, ensuring the vehicle can be deployed for
alternative collection routes.
Proved business case for larger deployment
Due to the Total Life Cost of operations and the reduced levels
of collection required, Albury City was able to prove a business
case for an extension of the deployment by 2 times and continues
to deploy. Schierle explains that she has been impressed with
the quality of the sensors themselves, as well as the depths of
reporting capability. Regarding waste data, she highlights the
ability to understand volumes of collections on average, which
allows council to build a greater predictability model for its landfill
sites and a more sustainable waste management model.
Schierle adds that the solution stood out from the wider market
due to the company’s specialisation in waste management and
climate change. “The vendor selection is vast in data collecting
sensor-based solutions, however Taoglas specialised approach
to waste management solutions demonstrated that the resulting
quality of infrastructure and systems will be focused and
customised to council’s needs”
Leon Hayes, SVP and GM, Connected Smart Services, Taoglas
says “Albury City Council and the City of Wodonga’s commitment
to making their respective cities smart through the adoption of
smart waste management solutions is a northern star that not only
regional Australia but also metropolitan cities across Australia can
look to in how to drive operational eiciency in waste collection.