Circular Services turned on an artificial intelligence-powered recycling robot Thursday at its Sarasota, Florida, plant. Glacier built the machine. It grabs recyclables off the line at up to 60 picks a minute and saves about 35,000 items a day.
The robot picks up aluminum cans and HDPE plastic, such as milk jugs and detergent bottles. It works along the plant’s residue line, where it goes after items that earlier sorting stages missed and that would otherwise end up in the landfill. Cox Enterprises paid for the installation through its Cox Conserves sustainability program.
Cameras and AI label each object that passes on the conveyor belt and tell the robotic arm what to pick. “The AI will tag all the objects that come through the line and tells the robot what to pick,” said Ting Zhang, Vice President of Business Development at Glacier, according to FOX 13. A built-in camera follows the robot’s work as it happens. If the system hits a problem it cannot fix, it alerts staff…