Torrevieja has presented a fleet of 188 vehicles for waste collection and urban and beach cleaning, with a total cost of 25.6 million euros. This comes two years after the company Acciona, which charges 2 million euros per month for the service, was awarded the contract.
The new fleet consists of 39 vehicles for waste collection, 93 for road cleaning, 20 for beach cleaning, 20 for the ecopark and 16 for other common services. There are still 15 vehicles to be delivered, but they are expected to arrive before next summer.
New technologies
- GPS Tracking: All vehicles are located by GPS knowing at all times their route positioning, times to make the routes, vehicle speeds.
- On-board weighing systems: This system allows to know the weight of the containers that are collected en route.
- Geopositioning of containers: All the containers of the municipality are located in cartography and it will be possible to know how many times that container has been emptied by the collector.
- Optimization of routes and fuel consumption: Since all vehicles are geolocated and know the routes they take, it allows you to adjust the routes, reducing consumption and minimizing the traffic of vehicles of the street pick-up service.
Acciona's total investment so far amounts to 29,375,579 euros, distributed between waste collection, road cleaning, beach cleaning, a gas plant and the new headquarters of the service.
The mayor also highlighted the citizen awareness campaigns, mentioning the 44% increase in the collection of paper and cardboard, 94% in the collection of plastic containers and 24% in the collection of glass since the new service was implemented.
Electric and compressed natural gas vehicles
The new fleet includes 56 electric vehicles with a ZERO label, as well as vans and electric motorcycles for surveillance and collection. Advanced technologies, such as GPS tracking, have also been incorporated, and noise levels have been reduced. Electric vehicles have ranges between 150 and 300 kilometers, and all batteries are charged with solar energy.
Although the new fleet represents a great advance, the service had initial problems. An external audit identified 50 breaches in the first year of the contract, including a lack of staff. Despite recent improvements, the shortage of staff remains a major problem.