SmartTrash clean technology

Education, awareness and clean technology is vital for the business of global waste and recycling management and the integrity of Earth and its biodiversity, a Weekend Daily Planet newspaper interview with Dale Thornton, Managing Director of SmartTrash International.

The construction industry is undergoing a green revolution designing or retrofitting buildings so they consume less energy, accumulate less waste and save on long-term operating costs.

Since buildings account for anywhere from nearly 10 per cent to as much as 45 per cent of carbon emissions the impact of sustainable building is potentially huge.

Thousands of entrepreneurs, scientists, governments, industries are doing their part for the environment.

"There's a degree of optimism that, at all levels, is dawning upon us that we have to change our behavior," explains Dale Thornton, Managing Director of SmartTrash International.

"We are witnessing a green shift taking place - a layering of innovations, laws and projects to achieve a more sustainable future.

Governments, corporations, scientists and community leaders are looking for ways to become eco-friendly. We are seeing the auto industry worldwide reinvent itself to cut back on carbon emissions.

According to Thornton it isn't enough to reverse the declines.

"If we are going to clean the planet's surface and air then business must find ways of saving costs while reducing emissions."

This year's Australia federal "stimulus'' budget for clean energy has seen all retro homes get free insulation to reduce energy usages and the government is setting up carbon capture and storage system similar to what the US and EU are proposing.

Australians are embracing eco-friendly behaviors and clean technologies, research shows. Most people are into recycling and a genuinely concerned for the environment.

"We tend to think of ourselves as green, but also as a developed country," said Thornton. "But we produce more waste per person and use more energy than any other country in the world,''

But there are striking examples of progress, and Thornton's clean technology SmartTrash is leading the way.

"A growing sense of corporate accountability for the environment only makes business sense," asserts Thornton.

"Retailers have become some of the most proactive environmentalists since they depend on pleasing consumers, who are more keen than ever to go green.

"There's a really happy marriage between things that are good for our environment and good for business."

Corporate Australia is being urged to set a better example by reforming its own behavior and spreading the word about sustainability.

"We talk a lot about technology and how buildings are built,'' said Thornton. "Buildings have people and people create waste that has to be picked up at minimum costs with minimum emissions.

SmartTrash clean technology

New technology is reducing the environmental impact from human-made pollution by picking up waste and recycling with cost reductions and less transport emissions.

SmartTrash offers advanced technology to better handle ongoing waste and recycling coming out of all businesses.

Dale Thornton and his partner Michael Melchiorre, who have been on the forefront of waste disposal innovations, have acquired the international marketing rights for SmartTrash - a clean technology that services a customer base of everything from large international retailers, to government departments, large scale property owners and managers, and large scale production facilities.

The system was designed in the US by Scott Brown and Steve Seltzer of American Trash Management who used their technologies to deliver value added to their clients. Following the success of the system in the US SmartTrash has now gone international and the technology has worldwide applications.

"We use the term trash on purpose because it means something of little or no value so it includes waste and historical products," states Thornton.

A key element to deal with its diverse client's trash management issues is the tech system that consists of a device that's installed on or near a customer's trash or recycling compactor.

SmartTrash then time stamps, records and analyzes compactor activity: energy use, safety door switches, and pickup and return. From there, the data is wirelessly relayed back to the a data center where it is analyzed to make decisions on whether to dispatch a truck to empty the compactor that compacts cardboard and waste products.

SmartTrash uses wireless as the underlying backbone technology for its system.

"We have to have something that works extremely reliably," states Thornton. "If we're going to do this, you can't go dark and have the device fail and the network go down because if you need to clean up waste behind a department store and you don't know what amount that you have there, you're in trouble."

While Thornton said he chose the system called SmartTrash from the US parent company, he said the system is that of clean technology that doubles as a cost register."

"Whereas a retailer has a cash register at the front to measure what's going out the front, our smart trash device measures what goes out the back of the business," he said. "This measurement allows us to turn their trash collection to a just-in-time system."

Instead of having trash be picked up on a schedule of, say 3 days per week, the truck might show up every 3 days, cutting back on emissions as well as dramatically reducing trucking costs."

There are three results that come from a just-in-time trash management system: reduced truck traffic, reduced greenhouse gases by getting more trucks off the road, and lower overall cost of managing the trash.

The SmartTrash management system is not completely automated. The system has internal staff that correlates incoming data emanating from the customer's site in 15-minute intervals. From there, these technicians can determine whether to dispatch a truck to collect the trash.

"A human being has to be involved," Thornton said. "There are just too many variables that can go wrong. It's not just the measurement issue. You also have to dispatch a driver in a truck and make sure they show up, and if they don't your just-in-time trash management system will not work."

From a customer point of view, SmartTrash wants to get its clients to look at the total costs of operations in terms of waste and scrap.

On average the technology saves any company about 35 percent on trash management. In the US Macy's Department Stores have installed the SmartTrash advanced technology to successfully complete the task of categorizing overall waste and recycling while reducing loads.

In Australia the two largest shopping centre groups are already using SmartTrash to cut emissions and transport costs.

About SmartTrash
Clean technology

- works almost anywhere in the world using wireless packet data cellular networks
- small Size: 8" x8" x 4" (20 x 20 x 10 cm) all-weather Nema 4 plastic enclosure
- remote control computer with wireless IP packet modem access
- embedded microprocessor using a 10 bit analog to digital converter for real time telemetry collection
- current sensor input and 5 digital inputs for monitoring compactor control status (2 powered inputs)
- world wide power supply 20/240V 50/60 Hz
- normally open/normally closed 10 ampere contact relay for preventing compactor operation.
- optional second RS 232 serial port
- battery backed memory with 10 year data life in event of power failure
- remote program update capabilities for revision of onboard algorithms
- on board watchdog system to reboot CPU & communication devices in the event of a program freeze due to a brown-out or power failure
- always on IP Packet Data Wireless System
- utilizes advanced 2G GSM GPRS or 2.5G CDMA 1xRTT technology
- operates on a wireless network