HOBI Weekly Blog Recap (5/22-26/23)
As technology advances and new components are launched, it’s important to understand how those inventions affect our everyday lives. The increasing use of artificial intelligence, in particular, offers plenty of advantages in making everyday life more convenient. For instance, the e-scrap industry can benefit from AI due to the nature and complexity of electronic devices, which have become challenging to tackle. Since these electronic devices are made up of various compound materials, removing them requires significant effort and time, not to mention how harmful it is to the environment.
Although it’s not widely used, recyclers have taken the initiative in reclaiming their recyclable material with robots that can safely perform the recovery processes. According to AMP Robotics, a company already applying AI and robotics to recover recyclables, its machine can pick up 80 items per minute. That’s twice as much as what a human can do. Like humans, AI robots can be taught to recognize and identify almost anything. For example, they can distinguish different colors, shapes, textures, patterns, brands, certain types of damage, and recognize the difference between aluminum foil and aluminum cans.
AI is driving down the cost of recycling and increasing the volume of high-quality raw materials while also decreasing the cost of daily activities in a facility. AI can improve the volume of quality materials, whereas old recycling methods can result in the loss of valuable materials due to imprecise and inconsistent identification of different components.
While AI-driven e-waste has a positive outcome, a few things are more concerning in the industry. For instance, developing and distributing a recycling technology of this kind is extremely costly, not to mention the obstacles of introducing this technology into an existing waste management system. Additionally, concerns regarding data privacy and the possible domination of the workforce must be addressed.
Although artificial intelligence is not without flaws, many environmental benefits may outweigh concerns, including addressing the ever-growing e-waste crisis by turning trash into something valuable, playing a crucial role in reducing the amount of manual labor required, and lowering worker exposure to hazardous materials.
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