Fraunhofer Institute of Optronics, System Technologies and Image Exploitation IOSB "Recycling is the largest source of raw materials in the world" - but high-quality products require to avoid downcycling, a highly selective material preparation. In order to close material cycles sustainably, it is therefore necessary to develop intelligent sorting processes to be applied. At the Fraunhofer IOSB, the solutions required for this are already being have been researched and implemented for years in the Visual Inspection Systems department.
Recycling
"Recycling is the largest source of raw materials in the world"
Fraunhofer expertise in sorting heterogeneous construction waste to produce homogeneous building products and secondary raw materials.
Optical computing for sorting of the construction waste fine fraction.
Read more about this in Fraunhofer IOSB's brochure visIT Recycling (pdf, German only).
Plastics in organic waste
Julius Krause
Detection of plastics by hyperspectral imaging, such as microplastics represent an unwanted contaminant, whereby the foreign matter can only be insufficiently separated from the waste due to moisture content and heterogeneity.
The second paper deals with a new approach for optical detection of plastics in organic waste directly in the collection vehicle.
Light contains more than just color
Jürgen Hock
For material-selective sorting, NIR cameras are used in recycling, among other applications. This article describes a flexibly programmable hyperspectral camera, which was developed together with an industrial partner and enables rapid adaptation to new tasks.
BauCycle - through optical sorting of fine-grained
demolition waste to functional building materials and components
Robin Gruna
Material-selective sorting of fine-grained waste is a difficult problem due to real-time conditions and the unfavorable "resolution to cost" ratio of NIR cameras. The paper describes an innovative solution and its implementation using the example of material-specific sorting of construction waste smaller than 2 millimeters.
blackValue - Recycling of black plastics
Wolfgang Melchert
The sorting of black plastics continues to be a major issue. Here we report on the development of a new hyperspectral terahertz sensor specially designed to solve this difficult task and integrated into sorting systems at Fraunhofer IOSB.
Tracking every step - Simulation-based development of tracking methods for optical bulk material sorting
Georg Maier
The sorting result stands and falls with the most accurate material ejection possible. The article describes innovations in motion prediction by using an area scan camera, which enables the tracking of objects at several points in time and the creation of a motion model based on this and the creation of a motion model based on this.