Onshore algae farms could feed the world sustainably
Onshore algae farms could feed the world sustainably
Growing algae onshore could close a projected gap in society’s future nutritional demands while also improving environmental sustainability.
I'd be down for some algae burgers if it helps the planet 🌿🍔
replace the meat and dairy industry with b e a n s
b e a n s
Tofu never started a pandemic!
The potential is great but I think it’s better to rethink our current choices and be more conscious with the food that we now have. If we lessen our consumption of animal meat then we can focus on feeding supposed animal feed crops to humans. The use of land and water would be less alongside lower carbon emissions.
This is the way.
We have solutions, or at least ways we could drastically improve things, but I guess folks would rather accept that they’ll be left with algae patties in the future rather than working to limit their animal consumption today. I don’t get it.
But animal meat is tasty 😣. Maybe plant based alternatives or lab grown meat will fill that gap and we can start using the farmland more efficiently
I get you and that’s why most environmentalists encourage people to go flexitarian instead of fully plant-based. Eating less animal products are no doubt better than doing nothing at all.
I committed to Veganism because it aligns with my personal ethics and so far, the mock meats have been doing great! Even when I was still living in a third world country outside US, I had access to delicious foods.
Humans need some meat in their ration, and lab grown replacements etc are now too expensive for most of the planet.
However, "some" doesn't mean a burger or two every day, so yes, there's space for improvement. Meat is really expensive in terms of carbon emissions.
Frankly I'm not sure how one would notably reduce emissions of anything without actual control (like by force) over most of the world, where green stuff is less relevant than hunger and illiteracy.
But maybe it's best that USA and EU and similar developed countries don't have that control. I mean, green energy etc sometimes seem more important than actual lives being saved for many.
I already eat a lot of algae but the packaging always has warnings that algae are very high in iodine. You usually can only safely consume a gram or so per day. Strange that they didn't address this in the article...
This could be for marine algae, which might have high iodine and sometimes high organic arsenic (though there is some debate over how toxic that is) - but freshwater algae are not necessarily high in iodine. Like spirulina for example.
Seems to be species dependent. But it doesn't seem to be well studied. But the variation in iodine levels is crazy...
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8035890/
How do you eat it? I'm just learning about the world of eating algae now--outside of seaweed, that is (which I also just learned is algae and not just some underwater plant lol).
Well, I've been vegan for >11 years and love Korean & Japanese food that's why I eat it. Usually with rice, i.e. roasted seaweed like Nori leaves or already in stripes. Or as sushi. Also in soup like misoshiru where you usually have the stock from specific algae and you can even put wakame seaweed in it. With sushi you can often also get a wakame salad, which is really tasty, too.
But usually I just cook rice (or use leftovers) and mix it with sesame seeds, sesame oil, soy sauce and some form of seaweed (usually I get a seasoned package of roasted seaweed with added flavors, but nori leaves work great as well). All in all this is a great staple food because you can store everything for longer periods of time and it is easy to make.
Hope this helps!
I wonder if it's only some forms of algae, or if they can reduce iodine levels with processing and genetic modification.
Yes, seems to be species dependent. But it doesn't seem to be well studied. But the variation in iodine levels is crazy...
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8035890/
I dont want to devolve into quoting like on reddit, but this article kept reminding me of the Simpsons.
"Thats what he was eating! Slime! And theres enough slime for all!"
This is interesting reading alongside the one from yesterday about blue carbon - in Aotearoa one of our fiord regions is looking at farming kelp in the same area, too!
After reading the article I'm thinking of trying to grow some. Anyone have experience with it and also on how it tastes? 😁
I watched some youtube videos about people growing spirulina in backyard pools. They tell all about how to do it. One guy says normally he would dry it to powder and add it to "regular" foods. But he sometimes just eats it as-collected. It has no taste, or sometimes a faintly "fishy" taste
Anyone here read Artemis by Andy Weir? Yeah...
I have it's a great book!
I feel like this kinda thing is a bit of a trope in sci-fi and cyberpunk, where one staple crop is used to cheaply feed a large number of people. In some works the staple crop is algae, in some it's soy, etc. Arguably, in the real world US it's corn.
I hope they taste great!
I'm sure we can bioengineer something that resembles fish taste with these 😃
Cool!
Wasn't Soylent Green algae based at first?
Can't we do this in vertical farms, industrially, and not only take no more land from nature, but give land back. The more land we can return to nature the better.
From what I understand vertical farming really only works out economically for high value crops. Using artificial light instead of the sun takes a lot of energy, and tall buildings are expensive and require maintenance. Algae tanks would also be SUPER heavy, which is a whole other problem.