The partnership will focus on increasing recycling rates for the spiral wound paper canister with steel bottom produced by Sonoco and other manufacturers
Sonoco and AMP Robotics have collaborated on paper can recycling. (Credit: Alex Pics from Pixabay)
Packaging company Sonoco has entered into a sustainable partnership with AMP Robotics to boost the recycling capacity of paper cans.
Both companies will work together to create a new material category within AMP’s neural network specific to rigid paperboard cans.
The partnership will focus on increasing recycling rates for the spiral wound paper canister with steel bottom produced by Sonoco and other manufacturers.
Sonoco sustainability staff vice president Elizabeth Rhue said: “Sonoco is uniquely positioned as a leading recycler to help deliver end-of-life solutions across our consumer and industrial packaging platforms.
“This partnership represents another step forward in our growing portfolio of sustainable packaging solutions.”
Any materials recovery facility with an AMP Cortex intelligent robotics system can now precisely and effectively sort Sonoco’s paper can to the desired stream, said the packaging company.
AMP Neuron, the artificial intelligence (AI) platform of AMP, comprises a real-world dataset of recyclable materials for machine learning.
AMP can classify over 100 different categories and characteristics of recyclables across single-stream recycling, e-scrap and construction and demolition debris, with an object recognition rate of more than 10 billion items per annum.
In the US, AMP has successfully shown the high-frequency recognition of steel-bottomed paper canisters and updated its software to facilitate platform-wide recognition of the material for sortation into any target stream.
AMP Robotics founder and CEO Matanya Horowitz said: “Manufacturers like Sonoco are directly influencing what is recoverable in recycling facilities and taking advantage of the ability to capture more of their specific packaging.
“Recyclers across the world with AMP Cortex gain this sorting capability, as they have many others. And because our AI is continuously learning, we’ll only improve the recovery of this and other materials over time.”
With around 19,000 employees in up to 300 operations in 34 countries, Sonoco provides consumer, industrial, healthcare and protective packaging solutions.
In December last year, Sonoco closed the sale of its European contract packaging business to a subsidiary of Prairie Industries for $120m.