Case Study: Kent County improves recycling efficiency and reduces labor costs with AMP robotics

How Robots Eased Labor Shortages and Improved Material Quality at Michigan Municipal MRF

Kent County, Michigan's Department of Public Works faced significant challenges in staffing its recycling sorting lines and was constrained by limited physical space within its facility. These issues hindered the county's ability to perform critical sorting tasks and threatened its goal of reducing landfill waste. To address this, the county partnered with AMP to deploy its compact AI-guided robotics system, Cortex-C.

AMP's solution provided Kent County with a consistent, reliable sorting solution that required a small footprint. The implementation resulted in an immediate reduction of three to four sorting line staff, lowering labor costs and achieving an ROI of under two years. Furthermore, AMP's robots significantly improved the purity of recovered plastics, enabling the county to process materials like polypropylene that it couldn't handle before. The vendor's technology and data portal also provided valuable operational insights, helping to stabilize the facility's staffing and material quality.

Kent County

Nic VanderVinne

DPW deputy director