T-Master
I recently met an entrepreneur who shared with me his business idea based on… weighing trash. At first I thought it was a pretty bizarre business concept. After a short conversation, however, it turned out to be a visionary project.
Imagine that you live in a multi-family housing estate and your garbage bin consisting of five-colored garbage bins was one day replaced by a segment of elegant containers stuffed with electronics that will agree to accept your garbage on condition that you introduce yourself by name and surname, and when you do, they will open the lid of the container, allow you to throw a bag of your waste into it, after which they will politely thank you in a pleasant female voice, and send information to your mobile phone about the number of kilograms of your waste, accurate to the second decimal place.
This solution is already in operation in the housing estates of three Polish cities: Zamość, Świebodzin and Cieszyn. Residents receive stickers with QR codes in five colours corresponding to five waste fractions: metal and plastics, paper, glass, bio, mixed. When they want to throw away rubbish, they stick the appropriate sticker with the code on the bag, which identifies the resident. Then, by bringing the bag with the sticker close to the QR code reader, they initiate the opening of the container, into which they throw the waste, which is then automatically weighed, and information about the weight and type of fraction is immediately sent to the central system, which supervises the entire process, and after a moment it is sent to the resident's mobile phone.
The solution enables the introduction of a mechanism for settling waste collection fees according to the actual level of waste generation by a resident. Next to electricity, gas, water and sewage, waste is the last medium for which we pay on the basis of collective responsibility. Municipalities determine the value of the fee by calculating the rate for a resident by dividing the total costs related to its removal by the number of residents. Someone who generates less waste pays exactly the same as someone who generates much more than the average. When you pay for your actual waste consumption, you will generate less of it.
Poland is a country with a relatively low waste segregation culture. This applies to most countries in Central and Eastern Europe that joined the EU relatively recently. In the old EU countries, waste is segregated at a much higher level. The leader in the EU is Germany, where well over 60% of waste is segregated. The implementation of smart bins in Zamość, Świebodzin and Cieszyn resulted in an immediate and rapid increase in the level of waste segregation – almost to the EU average. And this only happened because people realized that since the introduction of the new system, Big Brother knows how much and what kind of waste I throw away. So since I am being watched, I have to try.
The European Union has regulations that require countries to increase waste segregation levels. In 2022, the required level is 25%, in 2025 – 55%, in 2035 – 65%. EU law states that any commune that does not meet the required level in each subsequent year will pay penalties, the higher the further it falls short of the required level. For years, the level of segregation in each Polish commune has been checked in detail – garbage trucks transporting waste to municipal treatment plants are carefully weighed. Communes already pass on the costs of penalties to residents, but they are unable to enforce segregation discipline on their residents in a situation where a system is in place in which, regardless of the volume of waste and the level of segregation, residents pay one, equal rate for everyone. Smart bins can change that.
Most human business ventures that provide products or services that provide a smaller or larger benefit to the customer and supplier have a negative impact on our environment and the earth's resources. The project of weighing waste is unique in this regard, because Mother Earth has a net profit from it.
The entrepreneur who invented smart bins is Robert Szczepankowski, and the project is called T-Master.
And I am writing about it not only because I am impressed by the idea, but also because I will have the pleasure of contributing my small part to this endeavor.
