A case for systemic environmental analysis of cultured meat

Abstract

The environmental implications of cultured meat are profound: An anticipatory life cycle assessment of cultured meat published in 2011 showed it to have a smaller impact than agricultural meat in all categories except energy consumption (Tuomisto and Teixeira de Mattos 2011). As with most technologies, cultured meat will almost certainly be accompanied by unintended consequences as well as unforeseen costs and benefits that accrue disproportionately to different stakeholders. Uncertainty associated with new engineered products cannot be completely eliminated prior to introduction, but ongoing environmental assessments of the technologies as they advance can serve to reduce unforeseen risks. Given the pace at which tissue engineering is advancing, systemic assessments of the technology will be pivotal in mitigating unintended environmental consequences.

Could consumption of insects, cultured meat or imitation meat reduce global agricultural land use?

“…Although suitable culture medium can be produced from non-animal sources (e.g. hydrolysed cyanobacteria, sometimes known as blue-green algae (Tuomisto and de Mattos, 2011) and Maitake mushroom extract (Bhat et al, 2014)), an efficient process to manufacture animal-free media is still viewed as a major challenge, and a barrier to cultured meat adoption (Mattick et al, 2015a). Consumer perceptions are also a potential barrier (Hocquette, 2016).…”

“…Producing feed from algae is likely to reduce the land required for conventional livestock production, while increasing other inputs, and therefore we consider only the cultured meat aspect. Production of the nutrient 'broth' in which the cells are cultured (Mattick et al, 2015a;Verbeke et al, 2015) is possible from different inputs. However, as commercialscale processes for cultured meat are not yet available (Mattick et al, 2015a), the assessment of which feedstock would be selected to produce the culture media in the required quantities, and the associated efficiency are both uncertain.…”

“…Production of the nutrient 'broth' in which the cells are cultured (Mattick et al, 2015a;Verbeke et al, 2015) is possible from different inputs. However, as commercialscale processes for cultured meat are not yet available (Mattick et al, 2015a), the assessment of which feedstock would be selected to produce the culture media in the required quantities, and the associated efficiency are both uncertain. To represent this uncertainty the conversion efficiency range tested is large (Table 1).…”

Challenges of cultivated meat production and applications of genome‐scale metabolic modeling

“…The livestock sector directly (or indirectly) accounts for 70% of all agricultural land amounting to 30% of Earth's land surface and for over 8% of global human water use 9 . In addition, fecal waste is a leading cause of environmental pollution 11 …”

“…Cultivated meat notably creates no fecal waste, which removes the associated health and environmental hazards. Initial life cycle analyses suggest that land and water use and greenhouse gas emissions could be reduced by one to two orders of magnitude 11,15 from current levels.…”