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L. D. CARACCIOLO, Louis/Tressler & Co., 413 Cedartop Court, Harleysville, PA 19438

The potential for using ozone for carcass decontamination of beef, pork, turkey, and poultry has been debated for many years. Applied properly, ozone can be effectively and safely used in animal carcass washing with the added benefit of water reclamation and reuse as a means to increase the amount of water used while decreasing the waste water to drain. Recently, the use of ozone has expanded to every part of the plant, including red meat and poultry packing room disinfection, injection into vacuum tumblers, modified-atmosphere packaging injection, as well as hard surface decontamination.

The positive attributes of ozone over other compounds, including chlorine, are that it can help in the management of disinfection by-products and mutagenic substances while still being a useful antimicrobial both for direct contact and in the purification of water for rinsing and cleaning purposes.

Now because of the new GRAS status, a vision of how ozone might be used in the future will be discussed. Newest research has shown how and where ozone can be most effectively applied once users understand exactly what they are trying to accomplish with the ozone application. Often, direct contact of the ozone is not even necessary in a water-based system to get food science and safety benefits from its use.

A wide range of data available from the 1987 Food Additive Petition to the present in in-plant trials will be presented.