1. Millberry (ISRI Barley)
Millberry — code name Barley in the ISRI Circular — is bare bright uncoated copper wire, 1/16 inch and over in diameter, 99.95% copper minimum, free of burnt wire that is brittle, hair wire, insulation, plating and attachments. It is the highest copper scrap grade traded internationally and the closest scrap to refined cathode.
Source: industrial offcuts from cable manufacturers, transformer windings dismantled by licensed yards, and electrical fabricator scrap. Form: loose loaded or pressed into 250–500 kg bales. Container: 22–24 MT per 20GP loose; 24–26 MT bales. LME discount band 2026 CIF Nhava Sheva: 95–97% of LME Grade A 3-Month. Buyer: secondary refiners producing cathode, rod and wire drawing plants.
2. Berry and Candy (ISRI Berry / Candy)
Berry and Candy — ISRI codes Berry and Candy — cover clean unalloyed copper wire below 1/16 inch in diameter, 99.0% copper minimum, free of insulation and attachments. The two codes are commercially treated as a single grade because the chemistry is identical; the distinction is wire diameter.
Source: fine cable strands and electronic harness offcuts. Form: loose loaded or pressed bales. Container: 22–24 MT per 20GP. LME discount band: 93–95% of LME. Buyer: brass mill bar/rod producers preferring low-oxide feed, copper rod plants and certain secondary refiners.
3. Birch (ISRI Birch — #1 Heavy Copper)
Birch is clean unalloyed copper solids, 96% copper minimum. Pieces include clean copper plate, bars, busbar, tube and clean uncoated heavy copper free of attachments, plating beyond tolerance, gilding metal and tinning. Burnt wire that is brittle, hair wire and copper-bearing scrap are excluded.
Source: industrial demolition, electrical equipment dismantling, busbar offcuts. Form: loose. Container: 23–25 MT per 20GP. LME discount band: 90–92% of LME. Buyer: secondary refiners and rod plants able to remelt heavy material with minimal preparation.
4. Cliff (ISRI Cliff — #2 Mixed Copper)
Cliff is mixed unalloyed copper, 94% copper minimum, with limited tolerated attachments — light coatings, paint, solder and other materials normally found in mixed copper salvage. It is one grade below Birch in terms of cleanliness.
Source: mixed copper from end-of-life electrical equipment, plumbing offcuts and demolition. Form: loose. Container: 23–25 MT per 20GP. LME discount band: 86–89% of LME. Buyer: secondary refiners that can tolerate higher impurity load and recover from a wider chemistry envelope.
5. Druid (ISRI Druid — Insulated Copper Wire)
Druid is insulated copper wire, sold whole for buyers who run their own stripping or granulation lines. Insulation type (PVC, XLPE, rubber) and copper content (typically 50–70% by weight) are specified per shipment. Pricing is on recovered copper content rather than gross weight.
Form: 1-ton big-bags or loose. Container: 18–22 MT per 20GP. LME discount band: 78–84% of LME on recovered copper. Buyer: cable recyclers with stripping equipment, secondary refiners with granulation lines.
6. Copper Wire Chops
Copper wire chops are mechanically stripped copper produced by passing insulated cable through a granulation plant. Output is 95–98% copper by weight, free of insulation, with the remainder being residual plastic, fines and trace metallic impurities. Chops compete with Berry/Candy as low-oxide feed for brass mills and rod plants.
Form: loose or big-bag. Container: 20–22 MT per 20GP. LME discount band: 88–94% of LME depending on shred quality and free-flowing characteristics. Buyer: copper rod plants and brass mills that prefer pre-processed feed.
7. Copper-Bearing Materials and Lower Grades
Beyond the headline grades, the ISRI Circular covers copper-bearing scrap with lower copper content: Lake (clean refinery brass), Pales (refinery brass), Lace (heavy copper-bearing materials), and similar. These grades trade at wider discounts and are typically consumed by secondary refiners with broader chemistry envelopes.
International trade volume is dominated by Millberry, Berry, Birch and Cliff. The lower-content grades move more often within Europe or domestically in producing countries rather than across long ocean routes, because the freight-per-recovered-copper-tonne becomes uneconomic at lower content.