Astroneer: How-to Salvage Debris

Our Astroneer How-to Salvage Debris Guide features information on what you will need to recycle some of the old equipment that you will find scattered around the planets! Recycling this stuff will open up the ability to get some important resources like Iron and Tungsten without traveling the solar system.

What is Debris in Astroneer?

Salvageable debris can be found all across the worlds you explore in the game. It is structures that were created by past astronauts who had explored these planets in previous years. You'll find it pretty frequently as you explore around, and sometimes these piles will actually contain usable items that you can bring back to your base!

Debris comes in various sizes, from small pieces of broken items, to large out of use platforms and vehicles.

How-to Salvage Debris in Astroneer

It's a bit confusing early on what you are supposed to do with all the debris that is scattered around the planet, but you just need to get yourself a particular device that will take care of it. That device is called a Shredder. There's three different sizes of Shredder: Medium, Large, and Extra Large. The sizes of Shredder determine what size of debris you will be able to salvage.

To use the Shredder, you'll need to bring over debris to it and place it over the top. If it isn't too big, the machine will automatically start breaking it down and start to form Scrap. This Scrape can be used at the Trade Platform to obtain harder to get resources like Hematite and Wolframite.

The first one you'll create is a Medium Shredder, and unfortunately you can shred very little with this device. You'll want to try and upgrade to the larger versions of shredders pretty quickly to really start making some legitimate Scrap.

Shredder Recipes

You'll need to go off-world to get the requirements for these devices.

• Medium Shredder: 2x Iron
• Large Shredder: 1x Tungsten Carbide, 2x Iron
• Extra Large Shredder: 2x Steel, 2x Tungsten Carbide