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AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

spectrum.ieee.org

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Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#31

Post by geuis »

swayvil wrote: post #9
geuis wrote: post #3

I wish articles like this would just get to the point. We don't need yet another explanation of how recycling works, how it has low recovery rates, etc. Given the audience, take it as a given the reader has the basics down. Further down the author finally starts to talk about their topic (trash picking robots), but then digresses yet again. It's a really terrible writing style. State what your topic is up front with…

If you want to be taken seriously you need to pad everything out to 40 paragraphs. It's some kind of unwritten rule of the internet. Literally. They even have bots that cull succinctity or label it trolly. It's psychotic.

I remember in high school reading a Tale of Two cities. Absolutely disliked how all the language is over dramatic and flowery. Try reading some scientific papers from the same era. Many of them are similar in how they were written.

Then sometime after I read something by Mark Twain for the first time. I was blown away at how much easier and more enjoyable his writing style was.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#32

Post by jamal-kumar »

mistrial9 wrote: post #26
gloriana wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The consumer sorting is often not very good and requires multiple bins with a higher capital and operating cost for storage and collection. It's a pain for the users. Single stream trash is the way to go with robotic sorting is the way to go. No reason it can't scale. Amazing work, one of the best uses of labeling and machine vision I've seen to date.

I have experience in commercial recycling and was about to post something with dim details, but this comment says what I was about to say roughly. It is hard to read comments from people with good intentions but zero experience in commercial recycling. Single-stream versus household sort is one of the most basic choices of any municipal recycling program. Every operation has waste, flaws and mistakes, single stream o…

I'm wondering what happens to the woman who collects bottles in my neighborhood for her son's wheelchair when this technology comes to the third world.

That said the local garbage dump is encroaching on a refugee settlement, if it was something that could help it encroach less on that maybe it's a good thing.

Lots of factors here.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#33

Post by SoftTalker »

Animats wrote: post #20
sschueller wrote: post #4

What I find sad is to see startups here in Switzerland where we already separate and recycle extensively that offer a service where you just toss everything that can be recycled in the same bag. So batteries are mixed with plastic and cans. These bags compete with government collection facilities and are "reprogramming" people to be lazy. Regular trash is very expensive here and people who want to safe are forced to…

Centralizing this does not scale . Sure it does.[1] What doesn't scale is manual sorting. It complicates collection, because there are all those bins to empty,the trucks are more complicated, and humans aren't good at separating the different types of plastics. That's easy with multispectral imaging, but humans lack that capability. Bulk Handling Systems seems to be the US leader in this. Robots are used but do under…

Yep, this is why I only recycle aluminum, steel, and glass. Not even sure the glass is worth it. Everything else goes in the trash (saves the recycling facility the bother of doing that instead).

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#34

Post by ClumsyPilot »

quotemstr wrote: post #8
sschueller wrote: post #4

What I find sad is to see startups here in Switzerland where we already separate and recycle extensively that offer a service where you just toss everything that can be recycled in the same bag. So batteries are mixed with plastic and cans. These bags compete with government collection facilities and are "reprogramming" people to be lazy. Regular trash is very expensive here and people who want to safe are forced to…

Does sorting done by the general public count as "free"? It takes time and effort to route garbage to the appropriate bin --- maybe not much, but it adds up over the whole population. The desire to avoid this effort doesn't strike me as "lazy" any more than hiring a housekeeper or landscaper is "lazy". Economies of scale and division of labor make our society more prosperous. Why shouldn't we apply these principles t…

mixing items causes contamination, that is rgen harder to separate.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#35

Post by ackbar03 »

darepublic wrote: post #2

I worked at a mid sized startup where this idea was floated for developing a prototype. Neat to see it has become production level software somewhere

I don't think this is a particularly complicated idea actually. Why didnt you guys pursue it at the time?

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#36

Post by hedora »

Here's an idea:

Charge product manufacturers enough tax to get recycling of their packaging to 95%.

Aluminum and clear glass would immediately become more popular (they are mechanically sortable). I'm guessing the manufacturers would quickly standardize on a small number of plastics for everything else.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#37

Post by langsoul-com »

swayvil wrote: post #9
geuis wrote: post #3

I wish articles like this would just get to the point. We don't need yet another explanation of how recycling works, how it has low recovery rates, etc. Given the audience, take it as a given the reader has the basics down. Further down the author finally starts to talk about their topic (trash picking robots), but then digresses yet again. It's a really terrible writing style. State what your topic is up front with…

If you want to be taken seriously you need to pad everything out to 40 paragraphs. It's some kind of unwritten rule of the internet. Literally. They even have bots that cull succinctity or label it trolly. It's psychotic.

You might enjoy Derrick Sivers articles then. He goes out of his way to make everything short and concise.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#39

Post by TheDudeMan »

morcheeba wrote: post #5

A friend of mine worked at this company, and the bane of his existence was one popular Arizona green tea bottle. The plastic and glass versions looked identical[1], so no way to sort it visually. Great for brand identity, bad downstream. [1] https://www.plasticstoday.com/packaging/arizona-beverages-sw...

The article shows the solution to this being a glass breaker stage.
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