(The Defender) While the fake meat industry is being touted as an environmentally friendly and sustainable way to feed the world, the true intent is to recreate the kind of global control that Monsanto and others achieved through patented GMO seed development.
In the end, lab-created meats are worse for the environment than livestock and will undoubtedly deteriorate human health to boot, just like GMO grains have.
Lab-grown meat is worse for environment than cattle
As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, researchers at UC Davis warn there are major environmental downsides to lab-grown meat that aren’t part of the conversation or the decision-making process.
According to their “cradle-to-gate life cycle” analysis, the lab-grown meat industry produces up to 25 times more CO2 than traditional animal husbandry, which nullifies the core ideological foundation upon which the industry is built.
As noted by the authors, investors have poured billions of dollars into animal cell-based meat (ACBM) sector based on the theory that cultured meat is more environmentally friendly than beef. But that hype is primarily based on flawed analyses of carbon emissions.
The primary sources of CO2 emissions are the purification processes, which require fossil fuels. The bacteria used to produce the “meat” releases endotoxins, and these must be eliminated from the growth medium or else the cells won’t reproduce properly.
As noted by the authors:
“Animal cell culture is traditionally done with growth medium components which have been refined to remove/reduce endotoxin. The use of these refinement methods contributes significantly to the economic and environmental costs associated with pharmaceutical products since they are both energy and resource intensive.”
Based on this assessment, each kilo of cultured meat produces anywhere from 542 pounds (246 kilos) to 3,325 pounds (1,508 kg) of carbon dioxide emissions, making the climate impact of cultured meat four to 25 times greater than that of conventional beef.
Sham claims based on nonexistent technologies
The UC Davis life cycle analysis also points out that several estimates of ACBM climate impacts are dependent on novel technologies that either do not exist yet or are unlikely to work.
For example, some have proposed growing cyanobacteria hydrolysate in open concrete ponds to then be “harvested, sterilized, hydrolyzed and used as an animal cell growth medium.” The problem is that this technology is not currently used, “nor is it one that is currently near feasibility,” the authors note.
In short, the claims propping up the cultured meat industry are a sham, as the idea that cultured meat is a greener option is based on nonexistent technologies rather than the technologies that are in use.
Previous research also pokes holes in environmental claims
Other studies have also been critical of the ACBM industry’s claims. For example, a 2019 article in the journal Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems found that were the world to make the transition to cultured meat, its impact on global warming might initially appear to be beneficial. However, over time, cultured meat production would result in greater warming.
As concluded by the authors:
“Under continuous high global consumption, cultured meat results in less warming than cattle initially, but this gap narrows in the long term and in some cases, cattle production causes far less warming, as CH4 emissions do not accumulate, unlike CO2 …
“We conclude that cultured meat is not prima facie climatically superior to cattle; its relative impact instead depends on the availability of decarbonized energy generation and the specific production systems that are realized.”
False claims are par for the course
Despite analyses such as these, you’d be hard-pressed to find a cultured meat company that doesn’t claim to generate less greenhouse gas emissions than animal agriculture, although some simply talk in circles around it. Take Mission Barns, for example.
Mission Barns makes imitation bacon and meatballs by mixing pea protein with cultured meat and pig fat produced by cell culture to give the “meat” the flavor and aroma of real pork. Its website makes the following sustainability claim:
“Animal agriculture generates more greenhouse gas emissions than all transportation combined and is a major driver of deforestation and waterway pollution. Cultivated meat is much kinder to nature — using less resources to preserve our planet.”
Note that they’re not actually making any direct environmental claims about their own cultured meat. Instead, they argue that animal farming generates more greenhouse gases than transportation, which is irrelevant when it comes to determining which of two options — farmingor lab-created meat — is better for the environment.
If animal farming generates more greenhouse gases than transportation, then lab-created meats generate more greenhouse gases than transportation as well, and likely several times more.
It sounds good, though, and it’s confusing enough that most readers won’t realize that they just told you nothing about their own sustainability.
Are animals harmed in the making of fake meat?
Mission Barns also claims that no animals are ever harmed in its cultured meat process. All that is required to grow the meat, they say, is a “small sample [of fat cells] from a pig,” which isn’t harmed by the biopsy and goes on to live a normal, healthy life. The question is, what are the collected cells grown in?
Cultured or cell-based meats must be grown in a nutrient-rich media, and most are still using FBS, which is obtained from unborn calves that are cut out of the womb and drained of their blood while still alive.
FBS has long been used in science as it’s the perfect growth medium. So far, FBS has been considered a byproduct of conventional meat production. Supposedly, cows are not specifically impregnated to harvest the calves for FBS; rather, the calves are sacrificed whenever a random pregnant cow is slaughtered for meat.
However, unless FBS is abandoned across the cultured meat industry, it’s easy to foresee a future in which cows are raised and impregnated simply to supply the fake meat industry with FBS, which takes both food waste and animal cruelty to entirely new levels.
Animal cruelty on steroids
One could argue that the fake meat industry is already promoting a more obscene form of animal cruelty than animal farming in general, seeing how the increased need for FBS will require more pregnant cows to be slaughtered.
Are we absolutely sure that cows aren’t being impregnated and calves sacrificed just to satisfy this ever-growing need for FBS? As reported by Nutraceuticals World:
“Given the essential role of FBS in the production process, many of the soon-to-market cultured meats will not truly be completely animal-free or cruelty-free. Rapid growth of cultured meat would drive greater demand for FBS.
“Several companies, notably Meatable and Future Meat, have introduced alternative growth techniques that do not require FBS. For now, however, FBS-based growth stimulation is still the norm, and it somewhat taints the claim that cultured meat is totally humane.”
In 2018, Mission Barns CSO David Bowman argued that “fetal bovine serum is a non-starter” because the process is unsustainable. It requires the slaughter of “at least as many cows as are slaughtered now,” he said.
At the time, Bowman predicted that Mission Barns would, in due time, “have media recipes developed in-house that are patented.”
The question is, has the company invented a new media or are they still using FBS? Its “no animal harm” claim really hangs on that detail, and I’ve not been able to confirm it either way.
What ChatGPT says about FBS and its use
On a side note, a member of my team recently chatted with ChatGPT about the use of FBS in the cultured meat industry. Here are a few of the Q & A’s from that session.
Question — There are many articles about cultured meats utilizing serum from bovine fetus to grow the cultures, is that true?
ChatGPT — As of my knowledge cutoff in September 2021, the information regarding the use of bovine fetal serum in the production of cultured meats is accurate.
Traditional methods of cultivating animal cells for laboratory purposes, including the production of cultured meats, often rely on the use of fetal bovine serum (FBS) or bovine serum as a growth medium. FBS contains various growth factors and nutrients necessary for the cells to proliferate.
However, it’s important to note that the field of cultured meat is rapidly evolving, and researchers are actively exploring alternative methods to reduce or eliminate the dependence on animal-derived components.
The use of FBS raises ethical concerns, as it involves extracting blood from unborn calves. Moreover, it adds to the cost and scalability challenges of cultured meat production.
In recent years, significant progress has been made in developing serum-free or animal-free alternatives for cell culture in the cultured meat industry. Scientists are exploring plant-based and synthetic growth media that can provide the necessary nutrients for cell growth.
These efforts aim to make cultured meat production more sustainable, scalable, and free from animal-derived inputs.
Question — What is the process used to purify the serum from the fetal blood?
