That was an interesting read, thanks for the link!
But yeah, I had no idea it was so much worse for the environment. But it seems there’s still the possibility it will be better one day, so I hope for the best. I guess in the meantime I’ll stick with plant-based foods.
It says that it will only be worse if the stuff needed to make lab grown meat is purified at pharmaceutical levels; if the stuff is food grade then the claim begins falls apart.
I think it’s odd to even compare. One is a brand new industry, the other is a hundreds of year old process in terms of learning how to make it efficient. Over time, I have no doubt lab-grown can out-carbon footprint actual cattle raising.
I was going to say, all the articles and science I saw on lab meat previously had it consuming far, far less resources than the traditional beef industry. Definitely going to read more about it but I’m still team lab meat for now.
Edit:
“But in a preprint, not yet peer-reviewed, researchers at the University of California…” That’s not a good start to their point.
The comments on that preprint by another expert also don’t seem promising on their conclusions of lab grown.
I’ll believe it’s worse than traditional beef when more science substantiates that view. This article isn’t that.
Yeah so far it seems to be battling experts. UC Davis is a big agriculture/animal science school. On the other hand I don’t trust the lab meat industry’s own experts either. Hoping at some point to see a credible neutral analysis.
Even if cultivated meat was initially bad for the environment, I’d guess that it would be easy to minimize it’s environmental impact versus traditional meat. There’s only so much you can do to stop cows from belching CO2. However, a factory making vats of cultured meat could install pollution controls to reduce their emissions.
I’d definitely like to see peer reviewed studies backing everything up, but my guess is that cultivated meat will on par with or be better for the environment than traditional meat and will only get better.
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There are some analyses out there that suggest cultivated meat will actually be worse for the climate than animals - for example https://www.ucdavis.edu/food/news/lab-grown-meat-carbon-footprint-worse-beef
Of course the cultivated meat startups disagree: https://www.npr.org/2022/11/21/1138371310/a-taste-of-lab-grown-meat
That was an interesting read, thanks for the link!
But yeah, I had no idea it was so much worse for the environment. But it seems there’s still the possibility it will be better one day, so I hope for the best. I guess in the meantime I’ll stick with plant-based foods.
You should check out issues brought up about this article by other comments since yours.
I’ve read it, and there’s already two issues:
I think it’s odd to even compare. One is a brand new industry, the other is a hundreds of year old process in terms of learning how to make it efficient. Over time, I have no doubt lab-grown can out-carbon footprint actual cattle raising.
I was going to say, all the articles and science I saw on lab meat previously had it consuming far, far less resources than the traditional beef industry. Definitely going to read more about it but I’m still team lab meat for now.
Edit:
“But in a preprint, not yet peer-reviewed, researchers at the University of California…” That’s not a good start to their point.
The comments on that preprint by another expert also don’t seem promising on their conclusions of lab grown.
I’ll believe it’s worse than traditional beef when more science substantiates that view. This article isn’t that.
Yeah so far it seems to be battling experts. UC Davis is a big agriculture/animal science school. On the other hand I don’t trust the lab meat industry’s own experts either. Hoping at some point to see a credible neutral analysis.
Even if cultivated meat was initially bad for the environment, I’d guess that it would be easy to minimize it’s environmental impact versus traditional meat. There’s only so much you can do to stop cows from belching CO2. However, a factory making vats of cultured meat could install pollution controls to reduce their emissions.
I’d definitely like to see peer reviewed studies backing everything up, but my guess is that cultivated meat will on par with or be better for the environment than traditional meat and will only get better.