DENVER & GRAND RAPIDS, Mich.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--#AI--The Kent County Department of Public Works (DPW) in Michigan is partnering with AMP, a leader in AI-powered sorting solutions for the waste and recycling industry, to deploy an AMP ONE® municipal solid waste processing system designed to recover valuable commodities from mixed waste before they enter the county’s waste-to-energy process.
By recovering recyclable materials before combustion, the system will return commodities such as cardboard and select plastics to productive use while improving the thermal characteristics of the remaining waste stream. The strategic deployment will enable the waste-to-energy facility to process more municipal solid waste within its existing operating limits, increase landfill diversion, and preserve regional landfill capacity.
The system will process approximately 25 tons per hour of municipal solid waste from Kent County, using AMP’s computer vision and pneumatic sortation technology to identify and recover recyclables from bagged trash. With AMP’s solution, Kent County can:
- Recover valuable commodities from mixed waste;
- Improve recovery of cardboard and plastics before waste-to-energy processing;
- Enable greater throughput at the waste-to-energy facility;
- Extend regional landfill life; and
- Integrate recycling and waste-to-energy into a unified waste management strategy.
Municipal solid waste still contains significant quantities of recyclable material not captured through traditional recycling programs. By recovering these commodities before downstream processing, Kent County can increase resource recovery, preserve landfill capacity, and return valuable materials to productive use.
“Installation of sortation equipment at our Waste-to-Energy facility is an important step toward achieving our goal of reducing Kent County’s landfill waste,” said Dar Baas, director of DPW. “This will quickly become a best practice for the waste industry as we look to increase our efficiency; improve safety; increase recycling; and protect the air, land, and water in our community.”
The project demonstrates a practical approach to modernizing municipal waste infrastructure by integrating AI-powered sortation into existing operations. The approach provides communities with a lower-risk, faster-to-deploy pathway for expanding material recovery while evaluating future infrastructure investments.
“Communities across the country face increasing pressure on landfill capacity while striving to improve recycling outcomes within existing infrastructure constraints,” said Tim Stuart, AMP CEO. “This project demonstrates how AI-powered automation can help municipalities unlock more value from the waste stream, extend landfill life, and complement waste-to-energy systems in a cost-effective and scalable way.”
The project builds on AMP’s existing relationship with Kent County, which included the previous deployment of AMP’s AI sortation technology at the county’s Recycling & Education Center to support more efficient operations and advance the county’s broader waste diversion goals.
About AMP®
AMP Robotics Corporation (“AMP”) is applying AI-powered sortation at scale to modernize the world's recycling infrastructure and maximize the value in waste. AMP designs, builds, and operates advanced, cost-competitive facilities to process single-stream recycling and municipal solid waste. The company’s AI platform has identified more than 250 billion items and its systems have processed three million tons of recyclables. With three full-scale facilities and more than 400 AI systems deployed across North America, Asia, and Europe, AMP’s technology offers a transformational solution to waste sortation and changes the fundamental economics of recycling.
About Kent County
The Kent County Department of Public Works provides municipal solid waste disposal services to help ensure the effective removal, storage, and disposal of residential and commercial solid waste through various facilities and programs, including Waste-to-Energy, the Recycling and Education Center, North Kent Transfer Station, and South Kent Landfill.
Contacts
Media Contacts
Carling Spelhaug
carling@ampsortation.com
Matt McPherson
matthew.mcpherson@kentcountymi.gov
