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Industrial plastic recycling for pallet scrap

Last reviewed Nov 12, 20266 stages

The short answer

Industrial plastic recycling for pallet scrap has two machines in the middle: a shredder for the first cut and a granulator for the second. Between them and after them, the load is sorted and checked.

This section follows the load through those steps.

A mesh screen sets the flake size. What passes goes on; the oversize goes back to the grinder.

Why pallets need two cuts

A plastic pallet is a thick, solid, awkward shape. A granulator wants small feed. A shredder makes the pieces small enough. Shredding is rough. Grinding is the fine step that sets the flake size.

What happens before the machines

Sorting by resin and colour, a check for marks, and removal of metal and other foreign material. A tramp bolt in a granulator does more damage than any pallet. Racklify puts contaminant removal ahead of cleaning and drying.

What happens after

Flake is cleaned, dried and bagged, or melted and formed into pellets. Moulders then use it. Some blend it with virgin resin, and a recycled-content pallet may do so, so ask for documentation.

Where we sit

We sort loads and route them to processors that do the shredding and grinding. We do not claim a plant of our own or a processing capacity. We say what we think happens to a load, once it is seen.

Equipment and scale

Shredders and granulators come in sizes from a bench machine to a full production line. Pallets are big and tough, so they need a machine built for bulk plastic, not one for bottles or film.

Cleaning and drying

Some processors wash and dry the flake after grinding. Whether a given load is washed depends on the contamination in it and the use for the regrind, not on a general rule.

The pages in this section

Page	Covers
Shredding	The first cut
Grinding	The screen and the flake
Post-industrial	What a warehouse pile counts as
Near you	Finding processing by state

What the sources say

nelsoncompany.comNelson Company defines dynamic capacity as the load a pallet carries in motion, always below static; static as the load at rest and the bottom pallet's limit in a stack; racking as the load across an open rack span, often the lowest and given only for pallets designed for it.
blog.containerexchanger.comThe 800 x 1200 mm Euro footprint is the second most popular plastic pallet size worldwide.
blog.containerexchanger.comNestable pallets can cut empty-pallet storage space by up to 75 percent.
nelsoncompany.comAdvanced composite material pallets are 100 percent recycled polyolefins, cheaper with a shorter life, and suit export where the pallet is not returned.
nelsoncompany.comPallet capacities are issued by the manufacturer from calculation and lab or field tests, and assume an evenly distributed load.
eponline.comIn December 2011 a Los Angeles County Sheriff task force recovered over $250,000 of illegally obtained plastic pallets, including iGPS pallets, from a plastic recycler.
palletenterprise.comCalifornia AB 1760 (2022) lets recyclers take possession of stray proprietary pallets if the owner cannot be identified or fails to retrieve them in time, with a 35-day period before they can be declared abandoned.
en.wikipedia.orgPlastic pallets weigh about 3 to 15 lb when light and up to 300 lb when heavy; a typical GMA wood pallet weighs about 37 lb.
en.wikipedia.orgPlastic pallets are often described as lasting 100 trips or more, and can cost roughly 10 times as much as hardwood pallets.
resource-recycling.comGreystone Logistics processed about 60 million pounds of recycled plastic in the year ended May 31, 2024, using damaged plastic pallets from a buy-back program among its feedstock.
blog.containerexchanger.comNorth American plastic pallets in the common sizes are about 5 to 6 in tall.
en.wikipedia.orgMetal pallets are under 1 percent of the pallet market.
phsinc.comPHS lists 48 x 40 stackable plastic pallets with dynamic ratings of 2,500 to 5,000 lb and static ratings of 3,000 to 30,000 lb.
en.wikipedia.orgThe 48 x 40 in GMA pallet makes up about 30 percent of new US wood pallets.

Terms on this page

Shredder: A slow, heavy machine that tears whole pallets into large pieces before they reach the granulator.
Granulator: A machine with rotating knives that cuts plastic down to a set size, then pushes it through a screen.
Flake: The small, irregular pieces a granulator makes. Flake is regrind before it is sold or melted.
Ownership check: Our first step with any pallet that carries a name, logo, tag or colour that suggests another owner.
Pellet: A small bead made by melting regrind and cutting it. Pellets feed into machines more evenly than flake.
Moulder: A manufacturer that melts regrind or pellets and forms them into parts, such as pallets.
Virgin resin: New, unblended resin that has not been through a product before.
Recycled-content pallet: A pallet moulded partly or wholly from post-industrial or post-consumer resin.
Contamination: Anything in a load that is not the target resin: labels, metal, dirt, wood, food residue or another plastic.
Regrind: Plastic ground from used or scrap parts into flakes for moulding again.
Food contact: A material that touches food directly. Recycled content in food-contact use is held to rules a pallet deck usually is not.
Screen: The perforated plate under a granulator’s knives. The size of its holes sets the size of the flake.
Post-industrial: Scrap from manufacturing and business use, as opposed to material recovered from households.

Questions people ask

Do you shred pallets yourselves?

We route loads to processors that shred and grind. We list no plant or capacity.

Is shredding the same as grinding?

No. Shredding is the rough first cut. Grinding is the finer second step.

Can you process food-contact plastic?

No. Pallets only.

Do you own the machinery?

We describe and route loads. Shredding and grinding are done by processors.

Why shred and then grind?

A shredder tears the pallet into pieces a granulator can take. Putting a whole pallet in a granulator would jam it.

Got a load like this?

Five questions and a photo. We say what we think happens next once the pallets have been seen.

Send a load Find your area

Sources, reviewed Nov 12, 2026: Racklify encyclopedia, recycled plastic pallets; The Cary Company, what is regrind.