PT Bottle Classification Function for Pfand Equipment
Soyoung Kwon, Young–Hyung Kim, Jong‐Seok Lee, Jin-Hwan Park, Jinwoo Park, Yong–Hwan Lee · 2023
Approximately 8.3 billion tons of waste plastics are produced on Earth, and waste plastics that are not properly processed and recycled threaten our ecosystem on land and at sea. Since 2003, Germany has been using the Pfand system, which refunds deposits when containers are returned to reduce plastic waste. As a result, the plastic recycling rate is 97.4%, shows a high recycling rate. The system proposed in this paper simplifies the existing upcycling method and minimizes the cost incurred in the circulation structure by adding a function to separate renewable materials from materials requiring additional work to the existing Pfand system. It is a system that recognizes the QR or barcode of the product, classifies the product, and compresses and shreds the classified plastic. The proposed equipment classifies products by QR or barcode, but in the future, it plans to apply AI to classify products. In addition, handrails and stairs will be installed on the product so that elderly and disabled people in wheelchairs can use it comfortably.