Using IOT to support the Swachh Bharat

Abhiyaan and make India cleaner

akshatjain
October 2019

1. Abstract
Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan/mission is a campaign by the government, covering more than 4000 cities and towns,
to clean the streets, roads and entire infrastructure of the country. The aim of this mission is to cover all the
rural and urban areas of the nation and make them presentable to the rest of the world. IOT can play a very
important role in taking this mission forward an optimizing it to get better results. Smart devices, sensors,
chips, etc can be used to create systems that can help with waste disposal, segregation, collection and overall
management.

2. Introduction
IoT can help India greatly with its waste disposal problems and is already being used to create monitoring
systems to manage waste. Waste collection in India is very troublesome as most of the municipal bodies
lack sufficient manpower, proper garbage collection vehicles and also the know-how to monitor the quantity
of garbage collected. There is also need for waste segregation system that separates dry and wet waste,
mechanisms to alert authorities when bins are full and also better pickup and drop management systems
that can save cost of pickups and with that help in saving fuel and preventing the pollution that burning of
it accompanies. With IoT based systems in place, it will become way easier and convenient for municipal
corporations to monitor the whole waste management process and save a lot of time, effort and money along
the way.

3. Solutions
Now let us look at a few areas where application of IOT based systems might help the mission of cleaning
India :
3.1 Smart Bins
Smartbin is a solution that creates a network of dustbins that integrate the idea of IoT with wireless Sensor
Network. It can facilitate collection of large amounts of garbage very efficiently. In the medium and large
cities it is not practically viable to check each and every dump yard or dustbins to see whether it is full or
not. So these dustbins can be interfaced with microcontroller based systems having sensors system. In this
approach sensors are placed inside the dustbins to sense the level of garbage in them. Whenever the garbage
level reaches the threshold limit, the status of the dustbin is updated on the server and the server then sends
out signal to the concerned authorities. They can further delegate the work to the exact individual responsible
for waste collection and this way the dumping areas can be prevented from getting dirty and smelly.
3.2 Smart Waste Collection
Smart waste collection system basically take the process one step further and use the data collected from the
sensors to smartly create routes for waste collection such that the cost of collection is minimized. The data
collected through the sensors is transmitted to the server for storage and further processing. It is then used
for automating and optimizing the daily selection of waste bins, based on which the routes to pick several of
the waste bins from different locations are decided. Every day, the waste collecting teams receive the updated
optimized routes on their smart devices that help them navigate. Such systems can be designed to update
from past experience and decide not only on the daily waste level status but also predict the future state
based on factors like traffic congestion in the area where the bins are, industrial areas nearby, type of public
places nearby, etc.
3.3 Dry and wet dirt collection using Embedded Systems
The main purpose of this application is collection of dry and wet waste separately which is then placed in
a conveyor belt on which the dry waste collection dust bins are placed on the left side and the wet waste

1
 collection bins on the right side. The system fetches input from the collector by switches and sends signal
to the microcontroller unit using RF technology. This makes the H-bridge to rotate conveyor belt. When
the conveyor belt starts rotating the dust bin’s lid is automatically closed, this leads to the waste getting
dumped into the underground garbage container placed at the ground floor. Here IoT is used to control and
monitor the waste and the information is sent to the municipal authorities as well as the citizen. The mobile
application can also be used to see the timings an locations of waste collection vehicles.

4. Conclusion
Thus it is quite clear that the use of IOT can take the Swachh Bharat Mission to the next level and help us
show the world what we are capable of. The mentioned applications of IOT can not only help reduce effort
but also help save significant amount of money, time and also help reduce pollution. It is time that serious
thought must be put into applications of IOT in this field, only then can we achieve the goal that we’ve set
out to achieve.

5. References
http://ijrit.net/papers/December2017/V1I204.pdf
http://www.acadpubl.eu/hub/2018-118-21/articles/21d/7.pdf
http://anveshanaindia.com/wp-content/uploads/conference/paper/automation-
of-smart-waste-management-using-iot-to-support-swachh-bharat-abhiyan-
a-practical-approach-mr-bharadwaj-balu.pdf