Treatments
Available treatments for pallet and packaging timber include high temperature and gas fumigation for pests, kiln drying to remove moisture, fire resistant intumescent pressure treatments, preservative solutions against decay where food and drink is not involved, painting or staining for owner identification, non-tainting cleaning solutions and surface wax emulsion protection against moisture gain. Typical results of transparent wax emulsions on softwood specimens are illustrated here.
Benefits of wax emulsion spray after 2 years
exposure where specimen on left was untreated
Europe, North America and increasingly other countries all now have to take account of national or destination country environmental regulations, which often now limit or exclude the use of certain treatments. An example is copper chrome arsenate (CCA) which has been largely replaced in Europe and North America with a formula based on pressure treatment with one of the new copper quaternary compounds if timber is to be used in damp conditions.
When food, drink or pharmaceutical payloads are carried, pallet suppliers and users need to be wary of what treatments may have been used on timber, particularly now REACH introduces new requirements. We have specialist Datasheets on these matters on this site which explain some of these treatments and their limitations. Members should call us if a subject they need cannot be found by using QUICK SEARCH.
The new European REACH regulations to control chemical use, requires action by most wood pallet and packaging manufacturers who are termed Downstream Users and the Datasheets below detail what pallet and packaging manufacturers need to do to comply.
A PalletLink database of suppliers of various wood treatments in the UK and Europe is maintained, it is not part of this website so members should contact us for any suppliers needed.
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17b Antistatic conductive plastic pallets for electronic equipment (PDF 18kb)81j Issues with mould and stain appearing after kiln drying of pallets (PDF 20kb)83k Termite protection for pallets - effectiveness of chemical treatments (PDF 19kb)84h REACH regulations - specimen request to suppliers for registration data (PDF 19kb)84i REACH regulations - how they affect the pallet and packaging industry (PDF 25kb)85c Benefits of sulphuryl fluoride for fumigation (PDF 16kb)87d Wax emulsion treatment against moisture ingress and staining (PDF 41kb)98a Flame retardancy for wood pallets for specialist warehouse storage (PDF 18kb)