It would seem to me that a better solution would be a simple, traditional open-top can, and a solar powered, high-mounted (ie, out of reach) remote camera with

It would seem to me that a better solution would be a simple, traditional open-top can, and a solar powered, high-mounted (ie, out of reach) remote camera with sensing technology would get most of the savings with a much lower up-front and continuing capital cost. The main savings seems to be from being able to monitor when the cans are full, and only pickup when needed. To me, it would be simple to write an app that read in a x daily image upload of the can which automatically calculated the level of fullness. It wouldn't require specialised can hardware and could drive most of the benefit (only emptying when required). You could double the size if more capacity was required. Also, I would expect that these would fall into a very predictable pattern, with some cans requiring emptying 5 times a week, some 8 times a week, some twice a week. It seems some simple modelling would also give you many benefits for a very small upfront-cost. I have visited many friends places that had compactors installed when their kitchens were new, and over time they just stop bothering with the compaction and use it as a regular disposal. Usually because the compaction is messy, faulty or just too much bother to use. I would expect public trash cans to have the same problems, but magnified. The whole thing looks like a solution searching for a problem - bludgeoning a simple problem with too much technology.