Environmentalists have begun detecting illegal landfills using artificial intelligence technologies, including the Geometry geoanalytical platform developed by Sber AI. This was stated during the Russian Environmental Forum (REF) by Alexander Vedyakhin, First Deputy Chairman of the Board of Directors of Sberbank, quoted by the press service of the financial institution.
It was noted that the pilot project was carried out by Sber Business Soft and the Russian Environmental Operator. The relevant agreement was signed at the Russian Environmental Forum held at Sber University these days.
The main task of the neural network is to recognize satellite images and automatically point out areas where landfills may be located. This will make it possible to quickly stop the emergence and growth of illegal landfills and minimize damage to Russia’s environment.
To implement the project, the Russian Environmental Operator provided Sber with information on all known legal and illegal dump sites. Based on this data, we were able to flag and train an AI model. At the next stage, satellite images of Russian territory will be automatically analyzed by a neural network for the presence of natural garbage dumps.
From now on, AI data will be checked by volunteers who will inspect the sites and confirm or deny the existence of illegal dumping sites there.
According to Alexander Vedyakhin, over 15 thousand illegal landfills have now been registered in Russia. And these are just the ones about which there is information. New self-landfills are identified every year, but no one knows their exact number.
“Our project in partnership with the Russian Environmental Operator aims to get a complete picture of illegal landfills in Russia. Artificial intelligence technologies will help identify all natural waste accumulations in the country. As soon as the artificial intelligence model begins to recognize them reliably and accurately, the pilot project will be able to turn into regular monitoring, which will allow to quickly monitor the situation and stop environmental violations,” Vedyakhin explained.
General Director of the Russian Environmental Operator Denis Butsaev emphasized that thanks to the joint project with Sber, the environmental situation in the Russian regions will be assessed and proposals for the implementation of the results at the federal level will be developed.