The City of Regina will be looking at a new and more efficient method to check the materials inside of our blue carts.

Beginning this week through to the end of October, the City will be using a new automated technology to check the blue carts. instead of visual checks physically completed by the staff.

A camera installed on a recycling truck will take an image of the blue cart contents when its emptied and then software will track items that don’t belong. If an unacceptable item is spotted, an “Oops” mailout will be delivered to to the household regarding that incorrect item with helpful hints. This technology will allow more blue carts to be checked increasing the 2,000 in 2020 to 10,000 in 2021.

The pilot program is set to wrap up at the end of October, Janet Aird, Manager of Program, Development and Delivery says once the pilot program has concluded, the city will take time to reassess the results of the program. “We’ll review sort of the results, see how things went, look at the improvement that we saw in residents putting the right recyclables in. We use the information to inform future recycling campaigns about what items to keep out, the common mistakes and then we’ll review the feasibility of using the technology going forward.”

The City of Regina are receiving some local help with the camera. The automated technology was developed by Prairie Robotics of Regina.