Patterns in Recycling Waste Streams

Consider the complexity of recycling waste, a major reason it is not re-used efficiently enough is the cost of sorting it.  Training data would be interesting to see.

Recycling Centers Roll Out AI-Trained Robots
The Wall Street Journal
By John Murawski

Recycling facilities across the U.S. are starting to use robots guided by artificial intelligence (AI) to sort waste streams more quickly and accurately than human workers. For example, Sarasota, FL-based Single Stream Recyclers is planning to add eight robots from AMP Robotics to the six it already operates to help it process up to 350 tons of recycling waste a day. The robots can sort 80 items per minute, about twice as much as the average human worker. AMP uses robots from third-party vendors, to which it adds machine learning software trained on databases of images of water bottles, beer cans, milk jugs, food cartons, and other items. Meanwhile, a Berkeley County, SC, recycling facility is using nine robots from AI developer Bulk Handling Systems, which also uses off-the-shelf robots to execute its proprietary AI algorithms. ... "