Wikipedia fornece respostas:
In 2805, Earth is covered in garbage due to decades of mass consumerism facilitated by the megacorporation Buy n Large.
BnL evacuated Earth's population in fully automated starliners in 2105, leaving behind trash compactor Waste Allocation Load Lifter – Earth Class (“WALL-E”) robots to clean the planet, but they eventually stopped operating and Earth was left abandoned.
One WALL-E unit has managed to remain active by repairing itself using parts from other broken units.
E da IMDb FAQ :
How was Operation Clean-up supposed to work?
- According to Andrew Stanton ... the plan for Operation Clean-up ... was to use large machinery to incinerate massive sections of trash at once, after the WALL·E units had cubed and stacked it.