Scania tackles Brisbane waste

A delivery of 18 new Scania trucks made 12 months ago to Cleanaway Waste Management has made a positive impact on Brisbane's waste collection requirements, says the refuse specialist.

Cleanaway appointed the trucks after commencing a new contract in July 2018 with Brisbane City Council, in which the company was charged with transporting non-recoverable general waste from four resource recovery stations to landfill sites, all while keeping environmental impact to a minimum.

The new Scanias were a combination of 12 R 560 V8 and six G 480 six-cylinder turbo-diesel-engined prime movers, pulling new, bespoke bulk tippers or rear ejector loaders. The G 480s were tasked with pulling 22-tonne payloads in the single trailer rear ejectors, and 33 tonnes in the high-volume side tipper B-double trailers.

"The key criteria for the prime mover selection centred around reliability, flexibility of the trucks to undertake a wide variety of tasks, and an ability to accommodate an increase in payload as the amount of waste increases over time, in line with population growth," says Scania National Fleet Manager, Steven Alberse.

According to Shannon Gorman, Cleanaway's Landfill and Logistics Manager at the Brisbane City Council Resource Recovery and Innovation Alliance, Solid Waste Services, a recent review of the Scania trucks' performance over their first year of service was very positive.

"Brisbane's waste transport task is extraordinary," Shannon says.

"It is best described as a high-volume complex spoke and hub reverse logistics chain with an equally complex operating rhythm.

"At Cleanaway we had initially undertaken a comprehensive review of the Brisbane haulage task as a component of the tender and mobilisation, identifying potentially significant opportunities for productivity gains through modelling and asset configuration.

"I am proud to say that these gains have been realised. The bespoke Scania high-productivity multi-combination bulk waste transport vehicles have had a profound influence on the productivity, efficiency, safety and ultimate success of the essential waste services delivered to the city of Brisbane."

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Shannon says the trucks have now safely transported 500 kilotonnes of waste over 1.2 million kilometres within the city over the past 12 months.

"We believe that this bespoke high productivity fleet is the safest waste transport fleet in Australia," he says.

"Operating at Higher Mass Limits (HML), the fleet moves more waste in fewer trips, equating to less congestion, reduced emissions and overall lower impact on Brisbane's road network.

"The fleet also boasts a world-class, industry-leading, integrated in-cabin telematics system providing the highest possible standards of safety compliance, route efficiency, vehicle management and reliability."

Shannon says Cleanaway was attracted to Scania's offering on multiple levels.

"It goes without saying that Scania's offering met our necessary specifications, but the real value proposition was leveraged with Scania's tailored whole-of-life connected partnership solution.

"This smart and safe connected service platform offered powerful on road insights based on real-time telematics and vehicle performance with predictable maintenance, based on actual usage. This novel technologically advanced fleet management solution was sold to us as an opportunity to increase uptime, improve safety and reduce whole of life operating costs, sparking our interest.

Shannon says Cleanaway's drivers were also very happy find themselves behind the wheel of the new Scanias, too.

"When our newly formed driver team got to see, feel and touch their new 'European-designed office' for the first time, many of them were not familiar with European trucks.

"There was immediate appeal and positive commentary around the sharp looks and ergonomic features of the trucks. After outlining the truck's extensive array of innovative active, passive and in-cab support safety features, the team was reassured that Cleanaway's commitment and investment in safety was real."

These safety features include intelligent in-cab driver telematics, advanced emergency braking, electronic stability control, lane departure warning, adaptive cruise control, a smart camera system and driver efficiency scoring.

"In the first month of operation the data rich output we were receiving was confronting; for the first time ever we had absolute visibility of how our trucks were being driven on the road and to be honest it highlighted some inefficiencies," Shannon says.

While Scania provides driver trainers to help customers get the most from their trucks, a 'connected service eco-system' also provides intelligent dashboard views, fault identification, remote diagnostics, vehicle tracking and more, along with customisable reporting tools.

"This reporting provides almost everything you could imagine or need to manage up and down a business to optimise a transport operation," Shannon says.

"Recognising the need for a partnership with our drivers, we developed a rewards program to promote good driving behaviour and thank our improving and top-performing drivers. We have seen our average score increase greater than 25 per cent over the year, equating to significant financial savings as well as improving safety and environmental outcomes.

"These newly-formed partnerships between Brisbane City Council, Cleanaway and Scania are flourishing in what is a very challenging environment."

Brisbane Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner said Brisbane City Council was delighted to hear the partnership had been a success.

"Council is committed to creating a clean and green Brisbane for residents to enjoy, while ensuring our suburbs have the services and infrastructure to meet the needs of future generations," Cr Schrinner said.