Sorting electrical wire and cable before you sell it

Plate 01

The categories that behave differently

Large copper feeders — 500 kcmil, 750 kcmil and up — are the strongest category, because the copper weight per foot is high and the pull is usually straightforward from a limited number of termination points. Medium-voltage shielded cable adds value when it is a standard construction with usable length remaining, since there is a modest reuse market.

Tray cable and control wire are volume plays: lots of feet, moderate copper content, and labor-intensive recovery. Small branch-circuit wire in conduit is frequently not worth pulling at all unless it is being removed anyway for demolition.

Unused cable still on reels is a different animal entirely. New surplus cable on original reels with legible markings sells into the contractor market at real prices, and it should never be treated as scrap.

Plate 02

Length, gauge and termination count

What a buyer needs is conductor size, insulation type and voltage class, approximate footage, and how many terminations have to be cut. Two hundred feet of 750 kcmil with two terminations is a good job. The same footage split into twelve runs with forty terminations is a labor project.

Reel condition and markings matter on surplus cable. A reel with a legible tag stating type, size and footage sells for more than an identical unmarked reel, because the buyer does not have to discount for uncertainty.

Plate 03

What kills cable value

Fire damage, water immersion, unknown vintage on insulation types that have aged badly, and lead-sheathed or asbestos-jacketed constructions that carry handling requirements. Any of those move cable to recovery value at best, and some to a cost item.

Cable that has been cut into short random lengths also loses value — it becomes pure scrap regardless of what it was, which is one more reason removal method matters.

Plate 04

The honest arithmetic on conduit

Sellers frequently ask about the wire inside hundreds of feet of conduit in a slab or a wall. In most cases the answer is that the recovery cost exceeds the copper value, and the honest thing is to say so rather than to include it in a scope and quietly do a bad job of it.

The exception is when a building is coming down anyway. Then the cable becomes accessible as a byproduct of demolition and the arithmetic reverses, which is why cable recovery should be coordinated with the demolition schedule rather than planned separately.