Motala (Sweden) (AFP) – Discarded crisp bags, ketchup bottles and Tupperware containers speed along conveyer belts at a massive high-tech sorting plant dubbed “Site Zero”, which Sweden hopes will revolutionise its plastic recycling. Infrared lights, lasers, cameras and even artificial intelligence are used to sort the piles of plastic waste, Mattias Philipsson, CEO of Swedish Plastic Recycling, a non-profit organisation owned by the plastic industry, explains as he gives a tour of the plant. “We are burning more than we recycle” says Asa Stenmarck, plastics expert at the Swedish environmental agency, “so we really need to work with sorting.”
