Robot funded by the Can Manufacturers Institute will prevent the dumping of more than one million aluminum cans a year

WASHINGTON, DC – September 26, 2023 – The Can Manufacturers Institute (CMI) is using an innovative financing model to fund a robot at a California materials recovery facility (MRF) owned by Caglia Environmental (Caglia) that sorts single-stream recyclables. Designed by artificial intelligence and robotics company EverestLabs, the robot is expected to collect just over one million used beverage cans a year. CMI drew on financing from its members Ardagh Metal Packaging and Crown Holdings (Crown) to fully fund the two-year lease of the equipment to Caglia, which will share 50% of all revenues from UBC captured with the leased equipment with CMI.

This leasing program is the latest in a multi-year effort by CMI to demonstrate the potential for additional revenue for the recycling system through the capture of missorted UBCs and to stimulate the installation of additional can capture equipment at MRFs.

“We are excited about the lease model because it highlights that aluminum beverage cans are one of the most valuable recyclable products and exemplifies how this recycled beverage container pays its own recycling cost due to its high market value,” said John Rost, Crown’s vice president of global sustainability and regulatory affairs. “CMI’s research has concluded that without vital UBC revenues, most MRFs would not be able to operate without a change in their business model.”

The potential for capturing misclassified UBC in MRFs is significant. CMI’s 2020 study, “Aluminum Beverage Can: Driver of the U.S. Recycling System,” found that as many as one in four aluminum beverage cans is misclassified into a typical MRF. CMI also supported field testing in 2022 at five loss points across three diverse MRFs. This test found an average loss of seven to 36 UBCs per minute, representing an average annual revenue loss of $71,900 with a payback period of three years according to the ROI calculator that CMI commissioned and published online for MRF use.

Even at an MRF like Caglia’s at the Cedar Avenue Recycling and Transfer Station (CARTS) in Fresno, California, there is the possibility of capturing additional cans. This facility, which focuses on continuous improvement and has a recently upgraded single-stream sorting line, will place the leased robot on its “last chance line” to capture UBCs misclassified as material destined for landfill.

“We placed the EverestLabs robot on the last-chance line and focused it on aluminum beverage cans to pick ‘gold’ out of the trash,” explains Corey Stone, plant maintenance manager at CARTS. “This lease provides Caglia with a risk- and cost-free way to advance its goal of capturing all recoverable material passing through its facilities.” . EverestLabs’ easy-to-use, real-time analysis platform, coupled with an easily adaptable robotic cell with zero downtime and the industry’s largest guaranteed recovery, ensures recovery of all possible UBCs. With CMI wanting to recycle more aluminum beverage cans and Caglia becoming a leader in the recycling industry, this program is a win-win.

Caglia estimates, with previously conducted vision studies and analysis, that the EverestLabs robot will capture 32,000 pounds of UBC per year that would have otherwise ended up in the landfill. This is equivalent to collecting just over 1 million UBCs per year or about three UBCs per minute of operation. Caglia will share with CMI 50% of all revenue from cans collected through the leased robot, including revenue from the sale of UBCs and revenue from California’s recycled beverage container take-back program (i.e., the deposit return system).

“Considering that the metal is recycled forever (93% of recycled aluminum beverage cans become new cans and recycled aluminum generates 94% less carbon emissions than primary aluminum manufacturing), it is imperative that recycling sorting facilities collect all cans for the aluminum industry to purchase and recycle.”said Jens Irion, Managing Director of Ardagh Metal Packaging – North America. “We are proud to have instituted a circular financing model for the textbook example of the circular economy: the aluminum beverage can. Revenue from cans captured with the leased equipment can be used to fund even more can capture equipment at additional MRFs.”

“EverestLabs is delighted to partner with Can Manufacturers Institute, Crown, Ardagh Metal Packaging and Caglia Environmental to increase UBC recovery using RecycleOS, our AI and automation platform built specifically for MRFs and manufacturers.” said Jagadeesh Ambati, founder and CEO of EverestLabs. “With new investment models, we can accelerate the adoption of AI solutions to eliminate the loss of UBC in landfills, as it is a massive loss to the entire ecosystem.”

Now that EverestLabs’ 3D depth-sensing camera, AI and robot have been installed at Caglia’s Fresno MRF, the RecycleOS data platform is delivering daily reports on the number of UBCs misplaced each day, along with the economic value of these cans and the greenhouse gas emissions saved by recycling them. So far, the team is detecting up to 1,400 UBCs per day and recovering most of them to enter the circular supply chain instead of going to landfill. Caglia, CMI and EverestLabs plan to present updates with more data once the equipment has run for a longer period of time. Caglia plans to use the experience with this robot to see how else it can deploy the technology in its MRF to maximize its recovery efforts. CMI intends to support additional can catcher equipment at MRFs with the lease model and will use the lessons from this first lease to refine its approach to financing can catcher equipment.

Along with this first lease, CMI has also funded grants from The Recycling Partnership with capital from Ardagh Metal Packaging and Crown. The five grants funded in 2021 doubled the expected output, with 140 million aluminum beverage cans captured each year by the equipment installed under the grants. Earlier this year, CMI announced that Ardagh Metal Packaging and Crown provided funding for additional grants to be awarded through The Recycling Partnership.

EverestLabs, CMI and Caglia Environmental will hold an ISRI webinar on. “Industry Partnerships Driving the Deployment of AI and Robotics in MRFs” October 4, 2023 at 13:00. Registration can be found HERE. In addition, Scott Breen, CMI’s vice president of sustainability, will highlight this leasing program during a panel session on October 12, 2023, at the Paper and Plastics Recycling Conference.