[ITmedia News] 22 new "smart trash cans" installed in Akihabara, automatically compressing trash to about one-fifth, and monitoring the accumulation level remotely

On November 8, Chiyoda Ward, Tokyo installed and began operating a total of 22 smart garbage bins at 10 locations around Akihabara Chuo-dori Street and Akihabara Station. The aim is to reduce littering and at the same time utilize IoT functions to efficiently collect garbage.

The system was installed by Forcetech (Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo), a company that installs smart trash cans nationwide, using SmaGO. It runs on electricity generated and stored by the solar panel on the top of the unit, and when a certain amount of garbage accumulates, it automatically compresses it to about one-fifth to prevent overflow. The amount of garbage accumulated can be monitored in real time via the cloud. Of the 22 units, 10 are compressed types for general waste, and 12 are non-compressed types for recyclables such as bottles, cans, and plastic bottles.

According to the ward, Akihabara has long had a problem with the deterioration of its aesthetic appearance due to littering. In addition to the cleanup efforts of private volunteers, the ward has also been working on garbage collection early in the morning, but as the number of people visiting the city has increased, the amount of garbage has also increased. It is said that 11 million foreign tourists visit Akihabara each year, making it difficult to deal with the situation through local and administrative cleaning alone.

According to Force Tech, SmaGO is installed at approximately 80 locations nationwide. In the Omotesando and Harajuku areas of Tokyo, where existing trash cans were replaced, the number of collections was reduced by about 70%.

A post on the ward's official X account announcing the start of operation included comments such as ``I think it's a good thing to have more trash cans'' and ``This is wonderful.'' They welcomed the installation. On the other hand, there were also voices of concern about bringing in household and industrial waste.