DATE: March 05, 2008

CONTACT: Julie Northcutt, (864) 656-3688
jknorth@clemson.edu

WRITER: Diane Palmer, (864) 656-4741
spalmer@clemson.edu

Processing plants can save water by air chilling poultry

CLEMSON – About 9 billion chickens are processed in the United States each year and 63 billion gallons of water are used to cool the carcasses when they take a dip in cold water or an ice and water mixture. This is required to process this many chickens into ready-to-cook products.

The USDA-Food Safety and Inspection Service requires commercial processing plants to chill poultry to an internal temperature of 40 degrees or less immediately after slaughter to retard development of bacteria that cause food poisoning.

Julie Northcutt, Clemson University food safety specialist, has been working on a way to chill the birds using just air instead of water. 

“Air chilling would reduce water usage by as much as a gallon per bird,” she said, “and a higher percentage of air-chilled meat can be categorized as tender.”

There are two ways to air chill. One is dry air chilling, which sends a cold air blast to inside or across the bird, and the other is evaporative air chilling, using a cold air blast and water mist combination.

Most U.S. processing plants cool poultry using immersion chilling because it is the most economical and efficient.  However, air-chilled poultry is gaining in popularity because the birds bring a better price and immersion chilling is still associated with issues such as cross-contamination, carcass moisture retention and water-related environmental concerns.  The air-chilled method is common practice in Europe, except for exports to other countries.

“Air-chilled poultry does not appear to be any safer for consumers, but they may perceive it to be superior in quality to traditional poultry meat,” said Northcutt. “Moreover, the air-chilling process uses less water, and water conservation is critical for the future of the poultry industry.”

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