Summary Reader Response Draft 1

According to the article “A Little Robot That Cleans the Beach, One Butt at a Time” (2021), Gonderman explained how beaches can be kept cigarette litter-free with the use of BeachBot (BB). Artificial Intelligence is going to be advantageous in tackling pressing environmental challenges such as reducing litter on beaches and parks by having robots such as BeachBot to aid in cleaning up. Cigarette butts impact the environment greatly as they can cause marine pollution or pose a risk to animals’ health if they had mistaken it for food.

Firstly, cigarette butts are the main source of pollution in the sea and oceans. In a study published by NBC news in 2018, cigarette butts are a more harmful source of pollution compared to plastic and for 32 consecutive years, they are the most collected waste on the world’s beaches with a total of more than 60 million cigarette litter picked up over those 32 years. Cigarette butts thrown on beaches can easily find their way into rivers, seas, and oceans. Many do not realize that a single cigarette butt can pollute up to 500 liters of water and the impact of this waste globally on water resources are catastrophic.

Secondly, many people do not realize the interconnection between cigarettes and marine life. Despite cigarette butts being dropped on the land, many of them will eventually be swept into the ocean. When cigarette butts are in the water, they release toxic chemicals that pose a risk to the health of marine animals. With these toxic objects floating in the water, they can be mistaken for food by the wildlife with research showing that cigarette filters have been discovered in 70 percent of seabirds and 30 percent of sea turtles. Studies have described that with 4.5 trillion cigarette filters littered every year, a single one is capable of killing fish in a stream. Cigarette filters are affecting a large portion of life on the planet, reducing litter is the key to protecting them.

Lastly, the production of BeachBot does not only help with picking up cigarette wastes. It can also educate children by teaching them to pick up and dispose of any form of litter found. As BeachBot uses an image-detection algorithm, TechTic, the company that produces BeachBot has paid contributors of cigarette butts’ images so that it can learn to detect the different forms of cigarette butts.

However, the disadvantage of BeachBot is its speed in detecting cigarette butts and cleaning up. During World Cleanup Day at Scheveningen Beach in 2020 where BeachBot debuted, it only managed to pick up 10 cigarette butts in 30 minutes. September Compared to humans, BeachBot works at a very slow speed which may result in using a high amount of battery just to pick up a few cigarette butt’s litters. To clean up more efficiently, more BeachBots need to be put in place which could also result in high costs.

In conclusion, reducing the waste caused by cigarettes should be the main priority as the effects of cigarette litter in the ocean and on marine life are critical. With the advancement of AI robots, there is hope that in the future, more Beachbots will be put in place globally to help keep our environment cleaner and aid in protecting the ocean and wildlife.

References:

“Marine Life and Cigarettes: How Cigarette Butt Litter Harms Ocean Life”, Tobacco Free Life. https://tobaccofreelife.org/resources/marine-life-cigarettes-pollution/

Hahn “4.5 Trillion Cigarette Butts –  the Biggest Man-Made Ocean Containment – Are Littered Each Year” (April 2019), People. https://people.com/human-interest/cigarette-butts-oceans-trash/

Gonderman ““A Little Robot That Cleans the Beach, One Butt at a Time” (2021), Motortrend. https://www.motortrend.com/news/beachbot-ai-robot-techtics-cleans-cigarette-butts-beach/

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