How Do You Rate This Publication?       

Title:	Pallets: A Growing Source of Recycled Wood
Author(s):	Bush, Robert J.; Reddy, Vijay S.; Araman, Philip A.
Date:	1997
Source:	Proceedings, The Use of Recycled Wood and Paper in Building Applications. 24-28.
Description:	Considerable volumes of solid hardwoods, solid softwoods, and wood panels are used to manufacture pallets and containers in the United States. Increasing quantities of these materials are recovered from the waste stream for reuse and recycling. Two important groups involved in this recovery and recycling are firms in the pallet industry (SIC 2448) and landfill operations (municipal solid waste landfills and construction and demolition waste landfills). Firms in the pallet industry received an estimated 83.3 million pallets for recycling in 1993. Municipal solid waste landfills processed approximately 880 thousand tons of pallets in 1995. At construction and demolition waste landfills, approximately 162 thousand tons of pallets were processed. Ground pallet material is used to produce mulch, bedding, compost, soil amendments, and fuel. Products with building and construction applications include particleboard, fiberboard, cement board, insulation board, and wood-plastic composites. Strip flooring holds perhaps the greatest potential as a high value-added product from pallet wood.
	View and Print this Publication (64 KB)
Publication Notes:	We recommend that you also print this page and attach it to the printout of the article, to retain the full citation information. This article was written and prepared by U.S. Government employees on official time, and is therefore in the public domain. Our on-line publications are scanned and captured using Adobe Acrobat. During the capture process some typographical errors may occur. Please contact the SRS Webmaster, srswebmaster@fs.fed.us if you notice any errors which make this publication unuseable.
	Get the latest version of the Adobe Acrobat reader or Acrobat Reader for Windows with Search and Accessibility