Environmental damage has traditionally been addressed in bursts – a cleanup operation here, a monitoring campaign there. But the scale of modern environmental challenges is no longer episodic.
Each year, an estimated 8 to 12 million tonnes of plastic enter the oceans. Air pollution is linked to roughly 7 million premature deaths annually, according to the World Health Organization. The economic cost of environmental degradation runs into the trillions of dollars globally.
Against that backdrop, a shift is under way. [Read more…] about Saving the planet from humans: How robots are transforming environmental monitoring and cleanup