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 or carbon conductive plastic pallets. (PDF 65kb)81j Issues with mould and stain appearing after kiln drying of pallets. (PDF 72kb)83a Antistain immersion treatments. (PDF 64kb)83k Chemical treatment - termites. (PDF 55kb)84h REACH regulations and SVHC request to suppliers (PDF 64kb)84i REACH regulations - how they affect wood packaging (PDF 266kb)87d Wax emulsion treatment against moisture ingress and staining. (PDF 19kb)88m Far Eastern import measures for Zika virus prevention. (PDF 63kb)98a Flame retardancy for wood pallets. (PDF 24kb)