Emergence of Plastic Pallets
Wood has been the primary material used for making pallets throughout the industrialization period due to it's low cost. However, plastic pallets are slated to take over this role due to their several advantages. When it comes to the handling of hazardous materials and oil based liquids, plastic pallets are ubiquitous.
Benefits
By far the greatest benefit are their ability to withstand the effects of degradation. These effects include weathering, corrosion resistance as well as attack by insects. It can resist rain and rust unlike metal pallets. An early disadvantage was their susceptibility to cracking as their load capacity increased. This side effect has to a great extent been nullified due to advances in technology and plastic pallets are now extremely adept at handling loads.
Many countries and firms require that pallets undergo a process of cleaning or sterilization before each use.
Plastic pallets weather this process very easily and suffer no ill effects. Finally, these pallets are stackable. This means that due to the extreme precision with which they can be manufactured, they can be placed one on top of another (with or without loading) and in various racking arrangements efficiently.OSHA guidelines regarding Spill Pallets
Spill Pallets are used to satisfy the secondary containment requirements of OSHA regarding hazardous liquids and oil based products. Plastic pallets are exclusively used for this purpose due to their no porous nature and their ability to maintain their integrity upon contact with materials such as these. Also, there is great variability in the exact type of plastic that is used for spill pallets.
Secondary Containment
As discussed earlier, secondary containment, refers to having a "backup" storage in case the primary containers leak or suffer damage. OSHA regulations specify that the secondary containment needs to be able to handle 10% of the total volume in the primary container, or 100% of the volume of the largest container (whichever is more.)
Summary
For hazardous materials and oil carrying containers, plastic spill pallets are the only option. Even in other fields such as grocery management, plastic spill pallets are replacing wooden pallets due to their long life and space saving ability as well as the ease with which they can be moved around in a variety of ways.