In the rivers of the city of Baltimore (USA) a boat is floating, looking as if it had come from the past - because of the huge wheel that drives it. But in recent months, this boat not only did not pollute the environment with harmful emissions, but also fished 500 tons of various rubbish from the rivers, HiTech writes citing Business Insider.

The boat is driven by a river stream. If it is weak, then a wheel is connected, which is powered by solar panels. The vessel was specially created to clean up the rivers from debris. It has been floating since 2014 and during this time, 9 million cigarette butts and 500,000 plastic bottles and boxes were collected. It's all in addition to a bunch of other rubbish.

Garbage is collected from the container and sent for recycling. Now the creators of the project, including with the help of crowdfunding, are collecting money for the second such boat. By the way, the first one is named Mr. Trash Wheel - is very compatible with let and stupid, but good-natured view of this boat.

The only possible drawback of this scavenger is the lack of autonomy. It is served by the human team. But with this minus, inventors from Holland are struggling now. Their unmanned water cleaner Waste Shark is tested in the port of Rotterdam. The boat is able to collect up to 500 kilograms of garbage per flight.

The industry of garbage collection in principle becomes smarter. So a group of students with the support of the companies Volvo and Renova created a system of robots and drone that together search for filled garbage cans and help garbage trucks to do the work. And the Finnish company ZenRobotics has developed an industrial robot for garbage processing. The sensors of the system constantly monitor the flow of solid waste, and the program analyzes the data in real time.