Addressing odour abatement and assessment knowledge gaps using PTR–ToFMS

Abstract

Odour emissions from meat chicken sheds sometimes impact the surrounding community. These odour impacts and associated concerns present an ongoing challenge to the chicken meat industry in Australia. At present, the effectiveness of various odour abatement strategies being used by the industry is poorly understood. Defensible odour measurement and abatement data is necessary to justify the cost, and support the uptake, of odour abatement techniques.
This report builds on previous odour research funded by AgriFutures Australia to find ways to assess and measure poultry odour more objectively, conveniently and cost-effectively. It describes the use of state-of-the-art, high-resolution mass spectrometry (PTR–ToFMS) to determine the chemical composition of odour emissions from meat chicken sheds, and evaluate odour abatement strategies in terms of reductions in the compounds that contribute to odour impacts. This research provides deeper insight into the key odorants that abatement methods should be targeting and demonstrates the use of high-resolution mass spectra data for predicting odour concentration.