Abstract
Novel food production technologies are being developed to address the challenges of securing sustainable and healthy nutrition for the growing global population. This study assessed the environmental impacts of microbial protein (MP) produced by autotrophic hydrogen-oxidizing bacteria (HOB). Data was collected from a company currently producing MP using HOB (hereafter simply referred to as MP) on a small-scale. Earlier studies have performed an environmental assessment of MP on a theoretical basis but no study yet has used empirical data. An attributional life cycle assessment (LCA) with a cradle-to-gate approach was used to quantify global warming potential (GWP), land use, freshwater and marine eutrophication potential, water scarcity, human (non-)carcinogenic toxicity, and the cumulative energy demand (CED) of MP production in Finland. A Monte Carlo analysis was performed to assess uncertainties while a sensitivity analysis was used to explore the impacts of alternative production options and locations. The results were compared with animal- and plant-based protein sources for human consumption as well as protein sources for feed. Electricity consumption had the highest contribution to environmental impacts. Therefore, the source of energy had a substantial impact on the results. MP production using hydropower as an energy source yielded 87.5% lower GWP compared to using the average Finnish electricity mix. In comparison with animal-based protein sources for food production, MP had 53–100% lower environmental impacts depending on the reference product and the source of energy assumed for MP production. When compared with plant-based protein sources for food production, MP had lower land and water use requirements, and eutrophication potential but GWP was reduced only if low-emission energy sources were used. Compared to protein sources for feed production, MP production often resulted in lower environmental impact for GWP (FHE), land use, and eutrophication and acidification potential, but generally caused high water scarcity and required more energy.
Highlights
Food production is the main contributor to environmental change, such as climate change, land degradation, water scarcity and biodiversity losses (Campbell et al, 2017)
The results show that the Finnish average energy mix (FAEM) scenario had a higher environmental impact than the Finnish hydropower energy (FHE) scenario on all evaluated categories
The results show a high contribution of electricity production for both scenarios and across all impact categories
Summary
Food production is the main contributor to environmental change, such as climate change, land degradation, water scarcity and biodiversity losses (Campbell et al, 2017). The emerging field of cellular agriculture, which uses cell-culturing technologies for food production, has potential to contribute to the supply of sustainable alternatives to animal-based foods (Tuomisto, 2019; Rischer et al, 2020). Cellular agriculture includes technologies for cultivating animal, microbial, or plant cells in closed conditions, usually utilizing bioreactors with the objective to reduce resource use and environmental impacts, as closed production systems allow efficient recycling and control of emissions. Cellular agriculture may improve the resilience of food production towards environmental changes, as the production systems are not directly impacted by weather conditions and contamination by chemicals and microbes (Rischer et al, 2020). The use of autotrophic microbes that are able to obtain carbon from carbon dioxide (CO2) or methane (CH4) gas provides advantages as the production process is completely independent of outdoor agriculture. One promising example of a HOB for the purpose of feed and food production includes the Cupriavidus necator (formerly Ralstonia eutropha) (Yu, 2014; Liu et al, 2016)
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