The city of Venice's sanitation crew just got a new helper that is willing to work all day long, including weekends: Florida sunshine.

As they look for a bin to dispose of their napkins, paper cups and other trash, downtown shoppers in Venice are noticing that some of the city's steel, wooden bin-enclosed garbage cans have been replaced with solar-powered trash compactors.

Each 32-gallon, leak-proof receptacle can contain five times the amount of waste as a typical trash can because a solar cell keeps a 12-volt battery charged so the container can periodically compact its contents.

"This is a pilot program to see if it is something we can take advantage of," said Public Works Director John Veneziano. "You need to have significant savings to justify it. We'll see what kind of maintenance we have."

Each receptacle manufactured by BigBelly Solar, which has installed the technology at Times Square, in Raleigh, N.C., at Boston University and other locales, would cost $4,000 if the city bought it.

For the next year, the city will instead rent each unit on a trial basis for $169 a month. The receptacles include a separate bin for recyclables, which until now have not been segregated from most downtown waste.

Theoretically, the units should enable sanitation crews, which are emptying downtown garbage cans several times each week, to do so less often.

"We'll see how long it takes to fill up," Veneziano said.

Each receptacle uses a WiFi signal to notify sanitation workers when it is full.

The compactors could prove to be especially useful during and after weekend festivals, when sanitation crews are not on duty and garbage cans may be filled to overflowing.

The bins are also expected to reduce odors and, because they do not have loose lids, keep animals from rummaging through garbage.

Founded in 2003, BigBelly Solar is a manufacturer in Newton, Mass., that specializes in the receptacles. Among its largest clients is the city of Philadelphia, which has nearly 1,000 of the compactors that it estimates save it about $1 million in waste collection costs.

The city of Venice has 150 standard garbage cans at public parks and other locations.