Patent Application

App. No. 16/927,862

Abstract

Claims (43)

1 . A waste management system, comprising:

a waste detector mounted onboard a service vehicle and configured to capture image data of a receptacle encountered by the service vehicle;

a display; and

a controller in communication with the waste detector and the display, the controller being configured to:

recognize the receptacle within the image data;

determine a fill status of the receptacle based on the image data;

selectively determine a customer recommendation for a different sized receptacle based on the fill status; and

cause a dispatch to provide the different sized receptacle based on the customer recommendation.

2 . The waste management system of claim 1 , wherein the controller is further configured to determine an identification of a customer associated with the receptacle, and to determine the customer recommendation based at least partially on the identification.

3 . The waste management system of claim 2 , wherein the controller is further configured to determine the identification based on the image data.

4 . The waste management system of claim 2 , further including a location device configured to detect a location of the service vehicle, wherein the controller is in further communication with the location device and configured to determine the identification based on the location of the service vehicle detected at a time of image data capturing.

5 . The waste management system of claim 4 , wherein the controller is further configured to:

determine a trend of the customer to overfill or underfill the receptacle; and

determine the customer recommendation for the different sized receptacle based on the trend.

6 . The waste management system of claim 1 , wherein the controller is further configured to provide the image data to a machine-learning (ML) model, wherein the ML model is configured to identify portions of the image data.

7 . The waste management system of claim 1 , wherein the controller is further configured to:

determine existence of waste-related parameters in the image data; and

selectively determine the fill status of the receptacle based on the waste-related parameters.

8 . The waste management system of claim 7 , wherein the waste-related parameters include at least one of a receptacle lid angle, a mound height above a top edge of the receptacle, and an amount of waste around a base of the receptacle.

9 . The waste management system of claim 1 , wherein the controller is further configured to selectively filter the image data based on at least one of a distance from the service vehicle to the receptacle at a time of image data capturing and an angle between the waste detector and the receptacle at the time of image data capturing.

10 . The waste management system of claim 1 , wherein the display is located offboard the service vehicle.

11 . The waste management system of claim 1 , further including a sensor configured to generate a signal during servicing of the receptacle by the service vehicle that is indicative of a weight of waste in the receptacle, wherein the controller is in further communication with the sensor and configured to determine the fill status of the receptacle based at least in part on the signal.

12 . The waste management system of claim 1 , wherein the controller is further configured to automatically schedule the service vehicle to swap out the receptacle based on the customer recommendation.

13 . A method of managing waste services, comprising:

capturing, by a waste detector onboard a first service vehicle, image data of a receptacle encountered by the first service vehicle;

automatically recognizing, by a controller in communication with the waste detector, the receptacle within the image data;

determining a fill status of the receptacle based on the image data;

selectively determining a customer recommendation for a different sized receptacle based on the fill status; and

automatically dispatching a second service vehicle to provide the different sized receptacle based on the customer recommendation.

14 . The method of claim 13 , further including identifying a customer associated with the receptacle, wherein selectively determining the customer recommendation includes determining the customer recommendation based at least partially on an identity of the customer.

15 . The method of claim 14 , wherein identifying the customer includes identifying the customer based on the image data.

16 . The method of claim 14 , further including detecting a location of the first service vehicle at a time of image data capturing, wherein identifying the customer includes identifying the customer based at least partially on the location of the first service vehicle.

17 . The method of claim 14 , further including determining a trend of the customer to overfill or underfill the receptacle, wherein selectively determining the customer recommendation includes determining the customer recommendation based on the trend.

18 . The method of claim 13 , further including determining existence of waste-related parameters in the image data, wherein determining the fill status of the receptacle includes determining the fill status of the receptacle based on the waste-related parameters.

19 . The method of claim 18 , wherein the waste-related parameters include at least one of a receptacle lid angle, a mound height above a top edge of the receptacle, and an amount of waste around a base of the receptacle.

20 . A non-transitory computer readable medium containing computer-executable programming instructions for performing a method of waste service management, the method comprising:

capturing image data of a receptacle encountered by a first service vehicle using a waste detector;

automatically recognizing the receptacle within the image data;

determining from the image data a fill status of the receptacle based on at least one of a receptacle lid angle, a mound height above a top edge of the receptacle, and an amount of waste around a base of the receptacle;

identifying a customer associated with the receptacle based on the image data;

determining a trend of the customer to overfill or underfill the receptacle;

selectively determining a recommendation for the customer for a different sized receptacle based on the trend; and

automatically dispatching a second service vehicle to provide the different sized receptacle based on the recommendation.

Assignments (10)