The Future of Food | Climate Trailblazers: Reimagining Our Future

Summary

The video highlights the urgent need to address climate change, emphasizing how human actions are driving environmental crises such as rising temperatures, sea levels, and extreme weather. It explores innovative solutions in food production, including vertical farming, plant-based meats, and lab-grown alternatives, which aim to reduce carbon emissions and resource use. New technologies, from efficient farming to producing food from air, are revolutionizing agriculture. The message calls for a shift towards sustainable food practices, empowering consumers to play a key role in mitigating climate change.

Takeaways

• 🌍 Climate change is a global crisis, with rising temperatures, sea levels, and extreme weather events.
• 🚶 Human activities are the primary cause of climate change, and urgent action is needed to address it.
• 🌾 Agriculture is a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, using vast amounts of land, water, and energy.
• 🚜 Vertical farming is a more efficient and sustainable method, producing 100 times more per square foot than traditional farming.
• 🌱 New agricultural technologies, like seed genetics and vertical farms, aim to decouple growth from emissions.
• 🍔 Plant-based meats, like the Impossible Burger, reduce environmental impact by using fewer resources compared to traditional meat production.
• 🐔 Alternatives to livestock farming, such as plant-based chicken and microalgae, are being developed to reduce emissions.
• 🧬 Cultivated meat, grown from stem cells, offers a sustainable way to produce real meat without raising animals.
• 🥛 Companies like TurtleTree are using cellular agriculture to produce milk, which uses fewer resources than traditional dairy farming.
• 🔬 Future foods, like Solar Foods' protein made from air, represent innovative solutions to sustainably feed a growing population.

Q & A

What is the main cause of climate change according to the script?

The script states that human actions are the main cause of climate change, specifically pointing to activities like industrial production and energy consumption.

Why is there a need for a new industrial revolution?

The script emphasizes that the current industrial model has led to high emissions and resource consumption. A new industrial revolution is needed to decouple economic growth from emissions to mitigate climate change.

How does modern agriculture contribute to greenhouse gas emissions?

Modern agriculture contributes to greenhouse gas emissions through deforestation for farming, the use of fuel-burning machinery, fertilizers with a high carbon footprint, and long distribution distances which increase food miles.

What advantages do vertical farms have over traditional farms?

Vertical farms are more efficient, producing 100 times more per square foot. They use technology to optimize growing conditions, reduce food miles, and can grow a wider variety of crops, including those that are too fragile for long-distance transport.

How are companies like Bowery improving sustainability in food production?

Bowery improves sustainability by using controlled environments to grow crops with higher yields, reducing the need for pesticides, and locating farms near cities to decrease distribution distances and related emissions.

What is the role of seed genetics in vertical farming?

Companies like Unfold are developing seeds that are specifically optimized for the controlled conditions of vertical farming. These seeds improve yields and quality, making vertical farming more efficient.

How does plant-based meat, like the Impossible Burger, reduce environmental impact?

Plant-based meat uses fewer resources compared to traditional meat. The Impossible Burger uses 87% less water, 96% less land, and produces 89% fewer carbon emissions than beef from cows.

What is the environmental impact of plant-based chicken like Tindall?

Tindall’s plant-based chicken reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 88%, water consumption by 82%, and land use by 74% compared to traditional chicken farming.

What potential does microalgae have in sustainable food production?

Microalgae can be grown quickly with fewer resources and can replace traditional protein sources like soy. It also contains essential amino acids and vitamins, making it a nutritionally rich and sustainable alternative.

What are the environmental benefits of cultivated meat compared to traditional livestock farming?

Cultivated meat is expected to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by up to 90%, as it is more efficient in using calories to grow meat and eliminates the need for raising animals, which consume vast resources and produce emissions.

Outlines

00:00

🌍 Climate Change: The Defining Crisis of Our Time

The first paragraph highlights the pressing issue of climate change, driven by human actions, with rising sea levels, extreme weather, and a warming world. The narrator emphasizes the need for a new industrial revolution to decouple economic growth from emissions. They mention their efforts to measure the impacts of climate change, aiming to find strategies for slowing the damage.

05:00

🌱 The Growing Demand for Food and Agriculture's Environmental Impact

This paragraph discusses the challenge of feeding a growing population as food consumption increases. Current agricultural practices are resource-intensive, contributing to greenhouse gas emissions. It calls for change, introducing vertical farming as a more efficient alternative. The Bowery farm model is highlighted for its productivity, technology-driven control, and reduced environmental impact by being closer to cities and using fewer resources.

10:01

🍔 Innovative Meat Alternatives and the Future of Food

The third paragraph introduces plant-based meat alternatives, such as the Impossible Burger, which mimics the taste and texture of real meat. The focus is on the environmental benefits of these products, like reduced water and land use, and fewer carbon emissions compared to traditional meat. Innovations like heme from plants enhance flavor, and plant-based chicken alternatives, like Tindall, provide a sustainable option with similar benefits.

15:02

🦠 Microalgae and Lab-Grown Proteins: A Sustainable Solution

This paragraph explores the use of microalgae as a sustainable protein source, grown quickly with fewer resources. It highlights how microalgae can replace traditional flour in plant-based products, with benefits including essential amino acids and B vitamins. Additionally, lab-grown meat from stem cells, like those developed by Upside Foods, offers a promising way to produce real meat without animals, significantly reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

🧬 Lab-Grown Dairy and Revolutionary Food Production

In this final paragraph, Turtle Tree's lab-grown milk technology is introduced, using stem cells to create milk without animals. This process reduces greenhouse gases, water usage, and land needs. The future potential of producing milk from various mammals, including for infant formula, is also mentioned. The section concludes with Solar Foods' process of producing protein from air, offering a vision of food production that is independent of traditional agriculture and potentially carbon-negative.

Keywords

💡Climate Change

Climate change refers to the long-term alteration of temperature and typical weather patterns in a place, largely driven by human activities such as burning fossil fuels, deforestation, and industrial farming. In the video, it is portrayed as the central crisis of our time, with rising sea levels and increasing extreme weather events being key indicators. The video emphasizes the need to address climate change through innovative solutions in food production and consumption.

💡Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Greenhouse gas emissions are gases like carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), and nitrous oxide (N2O) that trap heat in the earth’s atmosphere, contributing to global warming. The video highlights how modern agriculture, livestock farming, and traditional food systems are major contributors to these emissions, particularly methane from livestock and carbon from deforestation and food transportation. Reducing emissions is crucial to mitigating climate change.

💡Vertical Farming

Vertical farming is the practice of growing crops in vertically stacked layers, often using controlled-environment agriculture (CEA) technology. This method is seen as a more sustainable solution to traditional farming because it is more space-efficient, reduces the need for water and land, and cuts down on carbon emissions from transportation. In the video, Bowery Farms exemplifies this innovation, growing crops close to cities with high yields and minimal resource use.

💡Plant-Based Meat

Plant-based meat refers to meat substitutes made from plants, designed to replicate the taste, texture, and appearance of real meat. The video discusses Impossible Foods, which makes burgers from soy, potatoes, and other plant-based ingredients while mimicking the flavor of beef. These alternatives significantly reduce water use, land use, and carbon emissions compared to traditional meat production, offering a more sustainable way to enjoy meat.

💡Methane Emissions

Methane emissions are a significant contributor to climate change, with methane being 26 times more potent than CO2 in trapping heat in the atmosphere. Livestock, particularly cattle, produce large amounts of methane, and the video explains that new technologies, like plant-based meats and lab-grown meat, aim to reduce these emissions by offering alternatives to traditional animal farming.

💡Food Miles

Food miles refer to the distance food travels from where it is produced to where it is consumed, contributing to carbon emissions due to transportation. In the video, food miles are discussed in the context of modern agriculture’s environmental impact. Vertical farming and local production models like Bowery Farms are presented as solutions to reduce food miles and ensure fresher, more sustainable food distribution.

💡Cultivated Meat

Cultivated meat, also known as lab-grown meat, is real meat produced by cultivating animal cells in a lab without the need to raise and slaughter animals. The video discusses how companies like Upside Foods are developing technologies to grow meat from stem cells, which could drastically reduce the environmental impact of traditional livestock farming by eliminating methane emissions and reducing resource use.

💡Carbon Sinks

Carbon sinks are natural systems that absorb more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than they emit, such as forests and oceans. The video explains how deforestation for agriculture not only destroys these carbon sinks but also releases stored carbon into the atmosphere, exacerbating climate change. Protecting and restoring carbon sinks is emphasized as a crucial component of sustainable food production.

💡Microalgae

Microalgae are microscopic algae, often found in freshwater and marine systems, that can be grown rapidly and used as a sustainable protein source. The video introduces microalgae as an innovative alternative to traditional plant-based proteins like soy, noting that it grows quickly, requires fewer resources, and can offer a more nutritious option. It is seen as a future solution to producing food in a resource-efficient manner.

💡New Industrial Revolution

The 'New Industrial Revolution' refers to the transformation of industrial processes to be more sustainable, decoupling economic growth from environmental damage. In the video, this concept is introduced to highlight the need for a major shift in how societies produce and consume goods, particularly food, to address climate change. Vertical farming, plant-based meats, and lab-grown foods are all examples of innovations driving this revolution.

Highlights

Climate change is accelerating with rising sea levels, more intense extreme weather, and human actions are responsible.

The need for a new industrial revolution that decouples growth from emissions is emphasized as the solution.

Agriculture as we know it is unsustainable due to its high land, water, and energy usage, contributing significantly to greenhouse gas emissions.

Forests, essential carbon sinks, are being cleared for farming, releasing more carbon into the atmosphere.

Vertical farming, such as Bowery Farm, grows food more efficiently, producing 100 times more per square foot than traditional farming.

Vertical farms use technology to control every aspect of the environment, increasing yields, flavor, and crop diversity.

Plant-based alternatives like Impossible Burger use 87% less water, 96% less land, and produce 89% fewer carbon emissions compared to traditional meat.

Tindall's plant-based chicken alternative reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 88% compared to traditional chicken.

New food production methods using microalgae offer a faster, more sustainable source of protein with all essential amino acids and B vitamins.

Upside Foods grows real meat from stem cells, with potential emission reductions of up to 90% compared to traditional meat production.

Turtle Tree produces milk from stem cells, reducing emissions, water, and land use by up to 96% while offering a sustainable dairy alternative.

Solar Foods produces a protein called solene from air, using CO2 and renewable electricity to create a carbon-negative food source.

New technologies like lab-grown meats and plant-based alternatives drastically reduce the environmental impact of food production.

The global food production system needs to evolve to meet a growing population and increasing food demand sustainably.

Consumers play a crucial role in driving change by switching to more sustainably produced foods, becoming climate trailblazers.

Transcripts

[Music]

our climate is changing the world is

warming

sea levels are rising faster than ever

and extreme weather is becoming more

frequent and more intense

the science is clear

human actions are to blame

climate change is the defining crisis of

our time

we are in a climate emergency

i spent most of my career trying to

measure the climate impacts of our

actions in the hopes that governments

can identify the best policies or

businesses can find the right strategies

to help us slow the damage

since the industrial revolution the

world learned to produce everything

faster and cheaper

as societies got richer we produced more

and consumed more energy more materials

and more food what we need is a new

industrial revolution a new playbook

that decouples growth from emissions

that revolution is gaining momentum

[Music]

food

it sustains us and so much more

but it could soon run out

affluence is driving up consumption so

is growth in populations

at the rate we're eating the world needs

to grow as much as 70 percent more food

in just 30 years

an unthinkable target if how we eat and

grow our food remains unchanged

[Music]

this is agriculture as we know it today

a land water and energy intensive

industry

also well-known is its greenhouse gas

emissions

[Music]

forests are nature's carbon sinks and

when that's cleared for farming more

carbon is released to the atmosphere

modern agriculture also involves

machinery which burn fuel and there's

fertilizers which also have a carbon

footprint

and since farms are located far away

from cities the food miles also drive up

carbon emissions

even before it reaches our plates food

would have already released 10

of all greenhouse gas emissions globally

vertical farms grow fruits and

vegetables much more efficiently

this is a bowery farm

it's a hundred times more productive per

square foot than a traditional farm

it's also packed with technology that

controls every aspect of the farm's

environment

our system can say based on what we see

and what we know but also what we expect

what tweaks and changes to the

environment around this specific crop

that we want to make and those changes

get pushed out and automatically

adjusted so you have this powerful

recursive learning loop that's iterating

testing watching iterating testing

watching at a very large scale which is

helping to drive not only increases in

yields but really exciting fun vibrant

taste and flavors in the crops that we

grow themselves

because conditions are so carefully

controlled barry grows a diverse variety

of crops

that includes many that are just too

fragile for traditional farms and long

distribution journeys

the farm is just outside the city so

distribution is cheaper and faster and

produce fresher when it reaches the

stores

we think about sustainability as being

multi-dimensional so it's of course the

component of resources but it's also

economic sustainability and commercial

sustainability and so we think a lot

about how do we make sure that we can

democratize access to high quality fresh

produce everybody should be able to try

great flavorful produce all the time

[Music]

while bowery makes farms more efficient

unfold selects and develops seeds that

are more productive for vertical farming

there's been a lot of investment in the

sector but it's really been focused on

the infrastructure of the farm really

amazing state-of-the-art facilities to

grow the crops what was missing was the

genetics or the seed that really is

optimized to be grown under those

conditions

unfold works on seed genetics and

digital solutions to offer new seed

varieties for fruits and vegetables

they want to help people worldwide get

fresh local and great tasting produce

so you want to have seed that actually

can respond to all that environmental

control that really is optimized for

production under artificial light with a

you know the systems that control all

the other environmental pieces one of

the ways you can optimize the

performance of that seed so that they

can overcome those challenges and

provide not just a product that works

for them but a product that really

delivers at the consumer level the kind

of quality that the consumer is looking

for

another type of farming is headed for a

reboot

livestock makes up half of global

methane emissions

methane is a greenhouse gas and it's 26

times more potent than co2

but new technologies in our midst are

making us rethink what we know of meat

the impossible burger

it's claimed to taste exactly like meat

but it's made from plants

it even bleeds like a medium rare burger

the protein packing burger is made from

soy and potatoes

and the fats come from coconut and

sunflower oils

there's also a mix of flavor ingredients

along with heme which provides the look

feel and taste of meat

heme is not only responsible for the

flavor of meat it's also a basic

building block of life on earth and it's

it's present in every cell whether it's

an animal or a plant it just happens to

be more abundant in animal cells and so

what our scientists discover is you

could also get that from plants we

started by extracting heme from the root

nodules of soybeans and that's why our

heme is called soy like hemoglobin

so we then adapted to do a fermentation

process which is the same process used

for belgian beer

or for making cheeses

um and so we use that process it's much

more scalable and essentially you're

growing that same heme the same heme

that's found in the roots of soy

but you're growing it in yeast um and

and then that makes it

much more efficient much more scalable

and so we're able to provide that

ingredient into our product at a low

cost

impossible is sold as meatless

alternatives in restaurants and

supermarkets in the u.s hong kong and

singapore

in the u.s the plant-based meat market

including impossible and others is worth

1.4 billion us dollars

making up 2.7 of all u.s retail packaged

meat sales

impossible says 9 out of 10 of its

customers are traditional meat eaters

meat made from impossible versus meat

made from a cow uses 87 less water 96

less land 89 less carbon emissions and

contributes 92 percent less water

pollution if you were to purchase one

pack of our retail product in store

that would be equivalent to saving 250

bottles of water and those are the big

bottles the bottles that are 500

milliliters

just with that one pack of impossible

burger

other meats are heading in a similar

direction

like chicken by far the most consumed

meat worldwide

tindall is a plant-based chicken

alternative with just as impressive

carbon savings

if you look at a tindo and compare it to

animal chicken it's about 88 less

greenhouse gas emissions eighty-two

percent less water consumption and

seventy-four percent less land

tindall's plant-based chicken is made

like this there are nine ingredients

that go into it

water soy wheat gluten wheat starch

sunflower oil natural flavoring coconut

oil methyl cellulose and oat fiber the

sunflower oil and natural flavoring are

what makes lippy a proprietary emulsion

lippie gives tindall the aroma taste and

cookability of chicken

put in a simple way it's chicken fat

made entirely out of plants it's an

emotion

made with natural ingredients entirely

from plants that recreates all the

experience you would expect from chicken

fat all of it will come inside the

fibers before the product is created

when you're cooking you will see it

manifest in itself through the browning

the smell the taste and when you eat it

you can definitely resemble

that delicious chicken taste that we all

love

tindol which is based in singapore was

developed in collaboration with local

chefs

singapore was where tindo launched its

global debut

and now has over 100 restaurant partners

across the world

when singapore did set itself to become

a let's call it a silicon valley of food

tech the amount of transformation that

has been happening has been quite

substantial

if you compare back to 2018 17 to today

it's a completely different environment

in terms of venture capital in terms of

startups in terms of multinational

companies with the r d centers here and

universities developing as well

they are programs around sustainable

food

[Music]

among more recent entrants joining the

fold is one startup that's making meat

from microalgae

where there is water there is microalgae

you can find it anywhere on this planet

in the ocean in the fresh water

sometimes you can even find it

in the fossil records

the microalgae is placed in a

fermentation tank and fed food waste

like spent grain okara and molasses

the microalgae grows and it's harvested

within three days and turn into a flower

that's rich in proteins

different strains of microalgae also the

way it's grown or fed could determine

different food flavors resembling

different foods

[Music]

the company plans to work with

plant-based protein producers to replace

soy and other flowers

flour from microalgae grows faster and

uses fewer resources

it will also be a lot more sustainable

when you trying to produce it and not

only that don't forget micro lg has all

the essential amino acids needed by the

human being it even has all the vitamin

b group so nutrition wise it will

possibly be even better than all the

protein flour that we're using so widely

today

plant-based meat alternatives are one

thing

but how about making meat without

animals

upside foods based in california grows

real meat from stem cells in a process

that is similar to fermentation

in 2017 upside foods demonstrated the

world's first cultivated chicken

we take high quality animal cells from

cows and pigs and chickens and we find

the cells that can continue to grow and

double and double and double just as

they would inside an animal at the end

of it when they touch each other they

start forming tissues just like they

would in an animal and then once they

start forming tissues they start

developing thicker and thicker layers of

muscle

and fat and connective tissues and when

we start to cook our favorite foods you

start experiencing food as it should be

with the deliciousness and the

desirability of meat but not the

enormous downsides that come with

raising billions of animals to feed

humans who love eating meat

traditional meat and dairy industries

using livestock farming account for 14.5

percent of total man-made emissions

that's 7.1 gigatons of greenhouse gases

annually

at scale upside expects its cultivated

meat production to emit significantly

fewer greenhouse gases

independent researchers project cuts and

emissions by as much as 90 percent

when we talk about first principles

cultivated meat takes animal cells and

grows them directly into meat

whereas an animal has to do a lot more

in addition to growing meat on it it has

to run around heal broken bones have

babies so it uses a lot of calories for

things that are not going into making

meat so at a very simple level with

cultivated meat

all the calories we feed our animal

cells are being used to make meat so

therefore

by a very vast margin cultivated meat is

going to be much more efficient in the

world to produce meat with less

resources

another singaporean startup disrupts

livestock agriculture in a different way

turtle tree makes milk in a lab

the process also involves stem cells in

this case from freshly expressed milk

stem cells are grown in a bioreactor

then lactation is induced in turtle

tree's patented lactation media a liquid

that contains various components

naturally present in mammals

the process yields milk components and

these could be used to produce various

dairy products

if you look at cellular agriculture

technology it's a lot more efficient

reduces greenhouse emission gas by as

much as 78 to 96

reduces water usage

from 82 to 96 percent

and reduces

land usage by 99 percent so it's a far

more efficient way and humane way to

produce milk

turtle tree says all milk from mammals

could be produced using their process

even infant milk powder currently made

with cow's milk

it's an industry worth 3.5 billion us

dollars annually and growing rapidly

turtle trees technology can make the

industry much more sustainable and give

people of all ages the benefits of human

milk

another new development is the epitome

of future food

imagine if food could be made from just

air

food our thin air sounds like science

fiction but actually at solar foods

we've been producing food out of thin

air for more than two years

what we are going to do next is build

our first commercial facility that we

call the demo it's supposed to be

operating in the beginning of 2023

and after that we scale it to an

industrial scale

the company makes what they call solene

a protein that's produced with materials

that are abundant in nature and a

process that could even be carbon

negative

that's because land now used for

agriculture could be returned so

performing their original role as carbon

sinks

it starts with a microorganism

cultivated in a fermenter

no sugars or other agriculture agents

are used to aid fermentation

water from air is split by renewable

electricity into hydrogen and oxygen

the cells are fed co2 hydrogen and

mineral nutrients

enough co2 for the process could be

captured from the air in an occupied

room

the fermentation process results in a

protein powder which could replace

agricultural products like soy and peas

used in making plant-based proteins

we can go literally to produce this food

in the middle of desert and it doesn't

end there we can go in urban settings

because

every one of us breathe about one

kilogram of carbon dioxide out every day

we can capture even from the ventilation

of buildings carbon dioxide that we

grease out

capture that and put it back into food

in urban settings therefore we can bring

food production very close

to to very urban

settings and

within mega cities of future

an agricultural revolution is underway

turning what was once science fiction

into reality

bold new technologies are reducing the

environmental impact of food production

it's now up to consumers everywhere to

make the switch to more sustainably

grown foods

an opportunity for everyone to be a

climate trailblazer

[Music]

[Music]

[Music]

you