Seed hatchery and oyster grower, Hoopers Island Oyster Co, has unveiled the first high-speed, laser-guided oyster processing system designed and built in the United States.
Pearlception 2.0 automates oyster sorting previously done by hand and is capable of processing up to 20,000 tonnes per year. It was developed in collaboration with Baltimore-based Backbone Mechanical Design at Hoopers Island’s Cambridge headquarters.
“As oyster aquaculture has become a recognised source of delicious, sustainable seafood worldwide, Hoopers has focused our considerable experience on creating equipment and systems to strengthen oyster farming’s infrastructure,” said managing partner, Ricky Fitzhugh.
Capable of grading, sorting and packaging up to 20,000 oysters per hour, Pearlception 2.0’s automated handling process eliminates chipping and waste caused by hand-sorting. A laser scanner is used to grade the oysters and can store up to 20 configurations with three grades each.
According to a 2017 NOAA report, bivalve shellfish production represents a large and growing segment of the global seafood industry. In 2016, US shellfish farmers produced nearly 17,000 tonnes of oysters.
“Over the past five years, aquaculture has enjoyed impressive growth in oyster production and as firms grow in scale it will be important to be able to mechanise some of the more menial tasks like sorting and counting,” said East Coast Shellfish Growers Association executive director, Robert Rheault.
“The development of innovative tools like Pearlception is critical to the maturation of our industry,” he added.
