How to test air quality?
Greetings,
My name Carolynn and I am a quality control assistant. I work in Ontario , canada in a small company doing flavors with essential oils , oleoresins and vanilla. I have been using this
forum to gain knowledge and familiarity with the HACCP system. We have just gone through our audit and have a non conformity for not testing the air quality. Does anyone have a suggestions on how we
could do this in house and what we would test for?
Thank you
Hello,
I can't say that I know of any in-house air testing methods. But, we have been using a company out of Texas called TRI Air Testing. It's a pretty nice deal where they send you the equipment and the testing supplies and then you mail the testing equipment back into the company. After only a few days, you can see the results on your account on their website. I'd recommend them solely based on the convenience. To be fair though, TRI is the only company that I have used, so I'm not overly versed in the options that are out there.
If you're looking for compressed air testing I can second TRI Air Testing. If on the other hand you're looking for environmental air testing there are various testing apparatus try searching google for "rotary centrifugal air sampler" "active air sampler" or if you're more concerned with price than precision "passive air sampling" which should give you some guidance on using settlement plates. For what it's worth at my facility we annually test compressed air via TRI Air Testing as mentioned before and sample all production environments semi-weekly using an active air sampler for APC as well as mold.
Hope that helps.
We use and recommend TRI Air as well - however they are located in Texas and you being in Canada I would suggest just contacting your local lab.
In Spain is not compulsary by law to test the air quality but it is being compulsary for sanitary controllers in order to validate the cleanning.
Basically we have two methods. We use a vacuum machine that aspires 1 m3 of air in a petri dish. The medium is prepared for Aerobic bacteria, yeast and fungi. So we use two culture mediums.
The other method is by decantation of air, so the medium is exposed to air at least 10 min.
The result is an indicator of good cleaning practices and can detect any contamination from high parts or ceeling...
I think any lab could help you in that affair.
Good luck,
If you have a look at some other threads "air" threads here, it may likely depend on from whom you are getting the NC ?.
There is a potential for massive over-elaboration in some circumstances.
If you don't have a lab at present, you may be better off out-sourcing. eg one of our sponsors -
I am an Assurance Manager and SQF Practitioner. First, I would look at why it is being requested. What are you using the compressed air for? Does your compressed air come in direct contact with the product as part of the process? Or, is it used for cleaning the equipment? Answer those questions first and the level of testing you'll need to pursue will be much easier to determine. As a packaging manufacturer, we use an in-house method for testing strictly for Yeast and Mold and a compressed air system maintenance on a schedule for particulates that I can explain to you, but if you determine the tests need to be more extensive or frequent, it would be more likely you would need to use an outside testing facility. Hopefully this helps give a starting point.
thanks , the issue is that we dont use compressed air in our processing at all. Their issue is the air quality in the production room. However , I think we are going to get an outside lab test for particles and mold . The products we deal with are pure essential oils and oleoresins which do not lend itself to microbial growth.
thanks , the issue is that we dont use compressed air in our processing at all. Their issue is the air quality in the production room. However , I think we are going to get an outside lab test for particles and mold . The products we deal with are pure essential oils and oleoresins which do not lend itself to microbial growth.
Hi carolynn,
It may depend on the FS Standard/Category but for SQF/previous threads, auditor expectations have varied between a simple air plate count to more detailed (eg iso air standard-type) data.
One seeming SQF "like" control measure is to install high spec. air filters.