Smart Garbage Monitoring and Alert

System Using IoT

Jayeeta Das, Ankita Pramanik and Susanta Kumar Parui

Abstract With the overcrowding of cities, the clearance of garbage has become the
most challenging task for civic bodies. Thus, a well-planned garbage monitoring sys-
tem is essential to keep the environment clean. Keeping in mind the above scenario,
this paper proposes a smart garbage monitoring and alert system using the concept
based on the Internet of Things (IoT) to maintain cleanliness and hygiene in any
locality. The system, proposed here can monitor the solid or liquid waste level in
garbage bin through sensors attached to it. An Android application is also developed
for accessing information such as coordinates, temperature, humidity, and methane
gas value of the bin. Through monitoring of these values, the clearance of garbage
can be done on a need basis. As the proposed system, is an internet-based system,
Wi-Fi connection is essential for its implementation. The developed system uses
IFTTT protocol to send notification in a time-efficient fashion.

Keywords IoT · Garbage monitoring · Ultrasonic sensor · Gas sensor · Wi-Fi

1 Introduction

Internet of Things (IoT) is the latest revolution of the internet which helps to commu-
nicate among billions of internet-connected objects through some agreed protocols
[1]. It can identify, locate, track, monitor, and manage the various real-world objects
effectively. IoT has wide applications in varied domains like healthcare, smart cities,
smart hospitals; smart environment, industrial and agricultural monitoring [2]. The
perception of the world is changing with the rapid increase of IoT connected devices

J. Das
Tata Consultancy Services, Kolkata, West Bengal, India
e-mail: [email protected]
A. Pramanik (B) · S. K. Parui
Indian Institute of Engineering Science and Technology, Shibpur, West Bengal, India
e-mail: [email protected]
S. K. Parui
e-mail: [email protected]
© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2020 641
S. Kundu et al. (eds.), Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference
on Communication, Devices and Computing, Lecture Notes
in Electrical Engineering 602, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-0829-5_60
642 J. Das et al.

[3]. The paper [4] provides brief overview of latest technologies and sensors used in
different applications of IoT. Some of the sensors used in IoT are proximity sensors,
infra-red (IR) sensor, gas sensor, temperature sensor, accelerometer sensor, etc. IoT
can be efficiently integrated into various applications to bring improvement in the
quality of life.
Nowadays the general awareness towards the improvement of cleanliness level
is increasing in our country. The government has also initiated various movements
to increase the cleanliness of the surroundings. But the problem of garbage disposal
is an important challenge for civic bodies. Overflowing, stinky bins lead to health
hazards. IoT can be efficiently used to develop a proper waste monitoring system that
can be placed in homes, schools, colleges, offices, shopping malls, and roads so that
the vision of maintaining smart cities [5] and forming better environment for living
becomes true. It brings new direction to the traditional wireless waste management
system. It takes a step towards “Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan” for cleanliness [6].
For the smart city vision, the present work proposes an IoT based smart garbage
monitoring and alert system which will notify the cleaning authority to empty the
bin on time. It uses the features of the Arduino microcontroller and Wi-Fi module,
DHT11, Ultrasonic, and MQ4 Methane (CH4) gas sensors. Garbage bins located in
different areas of a city can be constantly monitored by placing distance sensors on
top of each bin, thus giving us readings of the garbage level accordingly. When a
dustbin reaches maximum capacity, the garbage monitoring authorities are informed
to take immediate action. Moreover, the android app can be used to check the status
of the bin anytime. Additionally temperature and humidity sensor and gas sensors
are also attached to our system for monitoring atmospheric conditions and detection
of harmful gas emission.
IFTTT (If This Then That) is a free web-based service to create applets. Applets
are chains of conditional statements. Changes within web services such as Gmail,
Twitter, Facebook, etc., trigger applets [7]. Triggers are the “this” part of an applet
and Actions are the “that” part of an applet that results from the input of the trigger.
Within next few years majority of IoT devices will be connected to IFTTT.
The rest of the paper is organized as follows: Sect. 2 gives a brief literature survey.
Section 3 provides the proposed architecture along with the details of the hardware
and the developed software application. Section 4 provides the results and discussions
part and Sect. 5 gives the conclusion of the project.

2 Literature Survey

This section surveys the related previous works on garbage monitoring and waste
management systems. IoT based garbage management system has become a signif-
icant and growing concept to establish a clean and green smart city. The work in [8]
proposes a system for garbage clearance which is able to send an alert message to
the municipal authority with proper verification when garbage is filled. This system
uses an ultrasonic sensor attached to Arduino UNO to monitor the garbage level. The
Smart Garbage Monitoring and Alert System Using IoT 643

drivers confirm the cleanliness of the dustbins with the aid of RFID Tag. Users get
notification in their android application based mobiles.
A wireless dustbin monitoring and alert system using Arduino is proposed in
[9]. It can send an alert message to the server about the filling of the garbage or
the emission of harmful gases. Each dustbin is connected with GPS which helps to
monitor the location and status of the bins.
In [10] the authors propose IOT based smart garbage monitoring and clearance
system using sensor systems to check the level of garbage in the dustbins. The
system uses GSM/GPRS to know the position of the dustbins. A microcontroller
is used to maintain an interface between GSM/GPRS and the sensor system. An
android application to monitor the dustbin at different locations is also developed.
The paper [11] introduces a smart solid waste management method to overcome
the growing problem of solid waste disposal and maintain a green environment. The
system consists of renesas microcontroller, force sensor, passive infra-red sensor,
ultrasonic sensor, LCD, GPRS, GPS, Amazon cloud-based web server, and mobile
application. The web server updates the status of the garbage bins. PIR sensor is able
to detect human being and opens the lid automatically. The system can be used for
dry solid waste and wet waste separately. Daily clearance and proper disposal are
also necessary to maintain hygiene and cleanliness.
The work in [12] implemented a smart dustbin using AVR family microcontroller
and Wi-Fi module for clean and safe public space. Both authorities and common users
can access the uploaded data on the clouds to monitor the garbage bins in real time.
The system is user-friendly and cost-effective in terms of keeping the surroundings
clean and safe.

2.1 Contribution of the Paper

Most of the existing works have made use of Arduino Nano or Uno or Raspberry
pie along with ESP8266 Wi-Fi module. The usage of these components increases
the system cost. The present work proposes a smart garbage monitoring system at
a lower cost. The contributions of the present work can be briefly summarized as
follows:
• The proposed system ESP8266 NodeMCU board with inbuilt Arduino micro-
controller features. Thus, a single board makes the proposed system cheaper,
lightweight, and reliable compared to the existing works [8–10].
• An android application is developed to help in monitoring the system easily,
situated at any place, over the internet in real time.
• IFTTT (If This Then That) protocol is used here for notification purposes when
the dustbin is full. Thus, small applets that can be easily triggered by the changes
are created.
• Internet facility is used here for notification purpose rather than the usage of heavy
GSM modules [13].
644 J. Das et al.

• The proposed system has an additional feature of weather monitoring with its
temperature, humidity and gas sensors.
• The system detects harmful gases when it reaches the threshold value.
Overall the proposed system is very effective for usage in residential, commercial,
industrial or municipality places.

3 Proposed Architecture

The proposed system includes various modules like NodeMCU ESP8266 Wi-Fi mod-
ule, DHT-11 sensor, HC-SR04 Ultrasonic sensor, and MQ4—Methane natural gas
sensor. The open-source IoT platform NodeMCU is a self-contained Wi-Fi with the
features of microcontroller. DHT11 provides calibrated output of temperature and
humidity. Dry and wet waste can be differentiated depending upon the output tem-
perature and humidity value. It strengthens the monitoring purpose of the developed
system. The distance between sensor and the garbage level is measured by ultrasonic
sensor. MQ4 gas sensor is able to detect the traces of methane (CH4 ) and natural
gas in the sensitivity range from 300 to 10000 ppm. Any other gas sensor like MQ2
smoke gas detector, MQ5 natural gas detector, MQ135 air quality detector, MQ-7
carbon monoxide gas detector, etc., can be used as per the requirements. The Block
diagram is represented below in Fig. 1.

HC-SR04
Ultrasonic Dust
DHT-11 Sensor bin
Sensor

NodeMCU
ESP 8266 cloud
Power
WI-FI
Supply
Module

Mobile
App
Gmail
/SMS
MQ4
Gas
Sensor

Fig. 1 Block diagram of the proposed system

Smart Garbage Monitoring and Alert System Using IoT 645

IFTTT

Fig. 2 IFTTT with NodeMCU Gmail and SMS notification

An Android application is developed to access real time information. The appli-

cation is to be logged in with the username and password. This prevents any unau-
thorized use of sensitive information. When the garbage bin is full, SMS or email is
sent to the garbage monitoring system authority by the NodeMCU using the IFTTT
protocol. Figure 2 shows the integration of IFTTT with NodeMCU so that an SMS
or Email can be sent to the garbage monitoring system authority when the garbage
bin is full. A user account is needed on IFTTT.com for connecting the maker channel
within IFTTT [14]. We downloaded the IFTTT app on our android device. A key is
generated after creating the applet which is needed in the program code to run the
applet when the given condition is fulfilled. C++ programming is used on ESP8266
NodeMCU to implement the system.
The android phone needs to be connected to the internet. Arduino is programmed
based on two levels, i.e., the dustbin is empty and dustbin is full. For the purpose of
demonstration, garbage levels less than or equal to 6 cm is considered as empty bin
otherwise the bin is considered full. Figure 3 shows the flowchart of the proposed
system. At first NodeMCU reads the sensor value and stores data in the database.
After the user is logged in, he/she can view the status of the dustbin on main screen
of the android application.
Figure 4 shows the implemented system. Initially, the garbage bin is empty or
partially filled. The user sees the message “Dustbin is Empty” on the main screen of
their app. The information regarding the bin such as temperature, humidity, distance,
gas sensor value, latitude, and longitude are updated on the database. In the developed
app, the temperature, humidity, distance, gas sensor value, latitude, and longitude
value of the dustbin are displayed. After that the dustbin is started to be filled and
when it comes below the specified threshold value the message “Dustbin is Full” is
displayed on the main screen of the Android application as well as the server and an
Email or SMS will be sent to the garbage controlling authority so that the dustbin
may be cleared properly in time. After clearance of the dustbin the status is again
updated in the server and in Android application and the process repeats.
646 J. Das et al.

Fig. 3 Flowchart of the

proposed system start

Read sensor

Store data in the database

No Check whether
garbage reaches
threshold value

Yes

Send notification to the concerned authority

Garbage bin is cleared by authority

Update status of the dustbin

Repeat

4 Results and Discussions

Results that are shown in the Android app and web pages can also be shown on serial
monitor whenever the NodeMCU is plugged in with mobile or laptop or any other
display device. Figure 5 shows a snapshot of sample output which shows the status
of the developed system on serial monitor.
Test runs have been performed after the final system has been made which com-
pleted 30 full cycles of loading and unloading of garbage at three different places,
i.e., in air-conditioned room, at room temperature, and at open ground. Various pos-
sible combinations have been tested to assess performance of the proposed system.
As shown in Table 1 the garbage bin is empty first. Then it was started to be filled
Smart Garbage Monitoring and Alert System Using IoT 647

Fig. 4 Dustbin

for further experimentation. The bin was unloaded again and the same process was
repeated at the rest of the two places. The readings taken at those two places are
shown in Tables 2 and 3. The tables provide sample outputs of garbage distance,
temperature, humidity, gas value, latitude and longitude for a particular time instant.
Temperature and humidity change as the experimental setup was moved from the AC
room to normal room and then to the open ground. Tables 1, 2 and 3 show that the
proposed system works correctly as it shows real time values of the sensors attached
to it.
For further processing of the data, the android phone application is logged in by
entering proper User Name and Password. This feature is added to data security.
After the user is logged in, the information of the bins can be viewed on the main
screen. Figure 6 shows screenshot of the login screen of the Android application.
After logging in, the information displayed on the main screen is shown in Figs. 7,
8 and 9 for the three different places mentioned above. Figures 7, 8 and 9 show the
snapshot of sample outputs for different time instants. The sample output gives a
feel of the working of the developed app. It is to be noted that the app also provides
real time data. Google firebase cloud server is used here for real time monitoring
purposes. Google firebase is a development platform that provides database to the
users. Figure 10 shows the snapshot of the webpage.
To analyze the performance of the developed system, the collection of real time
data for five consecutive days from 29.09.2018 to 03.10.2018 has been taken. Data
has been taken between 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. of each day. After that the average values
of the experimental data of the consecutive five days are calculated. Only the final
average table is shown in Table 4.
In this system when the garbage bin is filled with waste beyond the threshold
value then an Email notification will be sent to the concerned garbage monitoring
authority or user to alert them about the situation using IFTTT protocol via the
internet. Alternatively, an SMS can also be sent to the registered authority mobile
number. The snapshot of the Email and SMS is shown in Fig. 11.
648 J. Das et al.

Fig. 5 Serial monitor output

Table 1 Experimental data from several tests run at AC room

Test Temperature Humidity Distance Gas Latitude Longitude Status
no (°C) (%) (cm) sensor (°N) (°E) of the
value bin
(ppm)
1 28 57 21 684 22.55498 88.30676 Empty
2 28 56 17 673 22.55498 88.30676 Empty
3 28 57 12 654 22.55498 88.30676 Empty
4 29 57 7 640 22.55498 88.30676 Empty
5 29 57 5 624 22.55498 88.30676 Full
Smart Garbage Monitoring and Alert System Using IoT 649

Table 2 Experimental data from several tests run indoors at room temperature
Test Temperature Humidity Distance Gas Latitude Longitude Status
no (°C) (%) (cm) sensor (°N) (°E) of the
value bin
(ppm)
1 32 79 15 616 22.55508 88.30675 Empty
2 32 79 9 607 22.55508 88.30675 Empty
3 32 78 7 595 22.55508 88.30675 Empty
4 32 78 6 598 22.55508 88.30675 Full
5 32 78 5 601 22.55508 88.30675 Full

Table 3 Experimental data from several tests run at open ground

Test Temperature Humidity Distance Gas Latitude Longitude Status
No (°C) (%) (cm) sensor (°N) (°E) of the
value bin
(ppm)
1 39 58 15 598 22.498 88.30651 Empty
2 38 59 12 595 22.498 88.30651 Empty
3 37 66 8 601 22.498 88.30651 Empty
4 38 58 4 591 22.498 88.30651 Full
5 39 58 2 587 22.498 88.30651 Full

Fig. 6 Login screen of android application

650 J. Das et al.

Fig. 7 Main screen display of mobile app when the garbage bin is in ac room

Fig. 8 Main screen display of mobile app when the garbage bin is at normal temperature

The system is useful for both indoor and outdoor usage. It has some additional
features of sensing environmental temperature and humidity also. The features of
the developed board are compared with the existing works. The comparison of the
performances is presented in Table 5. It can be seen that the developed system is
much better than the existing systems in terms of form, various sensor used, ease of
working, etc.
Smart Garbage Monitoring and Alert System Using IoT 651

Fig. 9 Main screen display of mobile app when the dustbin is on open ground

Fig. 10 Webpage to remotely monitor the status of the dustbin

Table 4 Average experimental data of the consecutive five days test

Time 09:00 10:30 12:00 13:30 15:00 16:30 18:00 21:00
Temperature (°C) 29.2 30.8 32 32.6 32.6 32.2 31.8 32.8
Humidity (%) 70.2 70.4 67.8 64 62.8 64 66.2 72.4
Distance (cm) 24 20.4 15.4 12.4 9 6.4 5.2 3.6
Gas sensor (ppm) 560.4 530 495.6 494.8 499.4 492 490.8 479.6
Status of the bin Empty Empty Empty Empty Empty Full Full Full
652 J. Das et al.

Fig. 11 Snapshot of Gmail and SMS notification to the user authority

Table 5 Comparison with existing works

Works Wireless Microcontroller Other Android Email/SMS Speed of
module board sensors application notification notification
[8] Wi-Fi Separate NIL Yes No Slow
Arduino UNO
[9] Bluetooth Arduino UNO Only gas No Yes Slow
sensor
[10] Wi-Fi Microcontroller NIL Yes No Slow
[13] TSRF Microcontroller No No No Slow
PIC 16F8 77A
[12] Wi-Fi Arduino UNO No No No Slow
Proposed Wi-Fi Integrated Temperature Yes Yes Fast due to
Arduino + and IFTTT
Wi-Fi humidity protocol
sensor, gas
sensor

5 Conclusions

The developed system finds multiple usages. The presence of any harmful gas can be
detected through the developed board. If the gas sensor value exceeds the threshold
value, the government authorities can be notified directly, i.e., without any human
intervention. Arduino based sensors are used here to reduce the cost and also make
the system efficient and portable. Here only 3 sensors have been connected. But a
maximum of 13 sensors can be connected with the developed system. Email or an
Smart Garbage Monitoring and Alert System Using IoT 653

SMS can be sent directly to the garbage collection center when the dustbin is full, by
the developed app. The system can also be used at home. Compared to the existing
works, the use of IFTTT protocol in the developed system can send notifications
quickly and efficiently. The use of ESP 8266 NodeMCU brings down the cost and
complexity of the system.
There are some minor limitations on which future research can be done. Google
firebase cloud server is used for real time continuous monitoring and only the anoma-
lous data are saved for notification purposes and for further analysis. If the good data
is needed to be saved then, a large storage or customized database is required. The
android software can be modified and a dedicated web server can be developed to
store large data chunk for a long time for future use. Through this dedicated server
various dustbins can be connected through a common network and routing among
various garbage bins could be done in near future. Thus, the system can be made
ready for global use in a smart city.

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