Issue link: http://palletcentral.uberflip.com/i/946815
palletcentral.com PalletCentral • January-February 2018 19 important goals. Both wood and cardboard pallet producers tout their environmental benefits. The primary benefit of cardboard pallets is they weigh 80 percent less than wood. That is an important distinction, but when examined more closely, it creates important choices for shippers. While cardboard pallets are fully recyclable, corrugated cardboard pallets are often used just once because of the durability issues they pose for shippers. While cardboard pallets are lighter than those made of wood, the carbon footprint of manufacturing a cardboard pallet can be five to ten times larger than manufacturing a comparable wooden pallet. Fewer chemicals are used to produce a wooden pallet than it takes to produce a cardboard pallet. In addition, wooden pallets last longer than cardboard pallets and can be used over and over, even when exposed to the elements. That means fewer of them need to be manufactured. The current market for pallet usage, according to a recent survey by Modern Materials Handling (MMH), indicates that 95 percent of pallet-using companies use wood pallets. Of those companies, 32 percent say they plan on acquiring even more wood pallets than they now use. A relatively small 17 percent of respondents expect to use fewer wood pallets in the next couple of years. The same MMH survey says that of the nearly 2 billion pallets used in this country, about 95 percent are wood and the remaining percentage are plastic, metal, composite or cardboard. The state of Oregon concurs that cardboard pallets have a very specific niche. In 2016, Oregon Governor Kate Brown directed the Oregon Department of Corrections to participate in a pilot program using corrugated cardboard pallets. In summarizing that trial program, a corrections department report (http://bit.ly/CUJofF) to the state legislature found that, "overall, the cardboard pallets tested did not work for the agency's transport and storage needs. In addition, cardboard pallets present a number of logistical and cost issues for the agency." Although corrugated cardboard pallets were not the answer in Oregon, product trials are likely to continue with other segments of pallet-using businesses. One such example is Haverford College in Pennsylvania which has written a letter to its vendors asking them to switch to using cardboard pallets for their deliveries to the college. "We're working our way through our vendor lists and have contacted about a dozen so far," said Jesse Lytle, vice president and chief of staff for Haverford College. "One supplier responded that Haverford was the first customer to make such a request of them, and they would explore options." Lytle added that the college will continue to work with vendors through "a transition phase. We expect that environmental and economic advantages of corrugated pallets will encourage suppliers to transition themselves. Re-use of existing products is always better than recycling, so we encourage all suppliers to collect their old pallets for re-use regardless of the material." In the case of Haverford College, NWPCA's Gething noted, "There are at least 15 wood pallet recycling facilities within 50 miles of (the college) that could assist in the wooden pallet recycling process." "In cases where unit loads are heavy, or conditions are wet, corrugated pallets are just not safe. Wooden pallets hold up under the stress of loading, transportation, and fork lifts and their drivers, as proven by the state of Oregon independent study." – Lindsey Shean, Valley Pallet