General Motors (GM) is a multinational car manufacturer headquartered in Detroit, Michigan. They are at the forefront of innovation when it comes to car manufacturing as well as being industry leaders in sustainability.

To recycle plastics in their facilities, GM must identify what type of plastic has been discarded. While this can be easier for standardized plastics used in the production line, miscellaneous plastics that are not as easily identifiable are often thrown away. GM requires a quick way to identify these miscellaneous plastics.

Our Recycling Identification System provides an improved method for managing plastics and reducing waste by ensuring accurate identification, preventing improper disposal.

When an unidentified plastic is encountered, the plastic scanner swiftly identifies the material by scanning it and displaying the result on a connected smartphone.

Once the plastic is confirmed, the user places it in the appropriate bin. Additionally, the app tracks all previously scanned plastics, providing a convenient reference to the correct recycling bins.

Admins can train the model further whenever new plastic types are introduced in the facilities. This ensures accuracy is maintained when an employee is scanning unknown plastics in the bins. Composite plastics are supported seamlessly and automatically with our robust model.

Our system quickly and accurately identifies plastics for efficient recycling, reducing waste and carbon footprint.

Our Recycling Identification System is built with a handheld scanner integrated with an Arduino microcontroller. The scanner utilizes a feed-forward neural network, and the mobile app, developed using React Native, uses a SQL database to save and display the plastic data.