Aspropyrgos Municipality, Cat Hellas and CAEN RFID trial a garbage collection monitoring via RFID in Greece

CAT Hellas, a Greek System Integrator leader in Control and Logistics applications, and CAEN RFID, leading provider of electronic instrumentation for Radio Frequency Identification, announce today a collaboration that has led to a trial installation of UHF RFID tags on the waste buckets and antennas and readers on the garbage collecting vehicles in the Aspropyrgos Municipality of the Greater Athens area.The project was initiated by the Technical Department of the Aspropyrgos Municipality revealing their thoughts to CAT Hellas technical personnel. Each waste bucket has an RFID tag with a unique code, and when the garbage collection vehicle raises the bucket in order to turn out the waste, the RFID antenna that is placed at the back of the vehicle reads the code that is stored in the tag. While the vehicle stops from bucket to bucket on its itinerary, it reads the code of each bucket and also stores the date and the exact hour. The system stores the data via the RFID reader in a PDA that is placed on the vehicle. When the garbage collection system completes its itinerary, it returns to its base and the collected data is transported, via a wireless network, to a computer (server). The server has a Data Base Management System for the control of all data from the vehicles.

Thus the municipality that exploits this application has a complete management system for recording the waste collection data as well as the control of all the collection procedures. It also has complete monitoring of itineraries as well as an estimate of the waste tonnage per itinerary, the tonnage per day, for all vehicles, per month, etc. With this information, the municipality can better manage itineraries and manpower, and has a monitoring system for the volume of the waste produced in the region of its responsibility.

“We are happy with the pilot applications and the used devices and software”, declared the Mayor of Aspropyrgos Municipality George E. Liakos. “Our Municipality will have a number of advantages from this application, such as real time information, better itinerary planning and organisation, better human resources management, resulting in an overall better organisation of work that will allow us to provide our citizens with a better service.”

“This joint pilot project with the assistance of Aspropyrgos Municipality’s technical staff Mr. Katsaros and Mr. Stefanis and their electricians too” declared CAT Hellas CEO Mikos Pesmatzoglou, “triggered an enthusiasm amongst our technical staff as it was really a pioneer application”.

“CAT Hellas has done an excellent integration of our products”, declared CAEN RFID Marketing Director Giovanni Grieco. “Thanks to their valuable staff and skills, they have been able to implement in a fast and efficient way our readers and on-metal tags in a real harsh environment, demonstrating the full benefits of an RFID installation for garbage collection.”

CAEN RFID readers meet European ETSI standards (ETSI EN 300 220 and ETSI EN 302 208) and EPC Global standards (EPC Class 1 Gen 2). With a reading capacity of up to 8 metres, these readers are the ideal solution for identifying goods on loading docks, for installation on gates for container and pallet tracking, and for warehouse management.

Information about Aspropyrgos Municipality

Aspropyrgos is located 20 km far from Athens, almost at the centre of Thriassio Pedio, and is crossed by the National Road Athens-Korinth. Thriassio Pedio is an area with long and rich history dating back to the classical ancient times. The history of the town in modern times begins in the middle of the 19th century. In 1960 the inhabitants were about 2000, had as basic employment agriculture and cattle breeding and supplied Athens with gardening products, cereals and dairy products. The establishing of small and big industries since 60’s converted Aspropyrgos into a major industrial city, which at the same time accepted a great number of immigrants from the country and from abroad. In the census of 2001 the municipality had about 28000 inhabitants making it first in population municipality of Western Attica. Industrial development and immigration changed completely the form and anthropography of the city. The inhabitants of the city are now employed in! industry and services while a very few of them are employed in agriculture and cattle breeding.

Information about CAT Hellas

CAT Hellas is a privately owned company dealing with applications and offering solutions on RFID, Access Control, Fleet Management, GPS. Amongst its biggest RFID applications is the TAXI monitoring project throughout Greece.

For more information about the project please contact:
Mikos Pesmatzoglou, CAT Hellas CEO
Phone: +30 210 9951651
E-mail: mnpcat@otenet.gr
Website: www.cathellas.gr

Information about CAEN RFID

CAEN RFID is a privately owned company, leader in the design and manufacture of UHF RFID readers and tags. The company is a recent spin-off from CAEN S.p.A. (Electronic Nuclear Equipment Construction), which has 27 years of experience in electronics for nuclear and particle physics experiments. This experience has enabled CAEN to take on the challenge of new industries such as Aerospace, Microelectronics and the emerging RFID technology. CAEN RFID has been the first company in Europe to manufacture and supply UHF (Ultra High Frequency) long range readers. CAEN RFID’s active participation in EPC Global and ETSI workgroups enables the company to supply state-of-the-art RFID readers and tags for any application.

For more information please contact:
CAEN RFID srl
Phone: +39 0584 388398
Fax: +39 0584 388959
Email: info@caenrfid.com
Website: www.caenrfid.com