Are plant-based meats actually sustainable? (Impossible Burger & Beyond Meat)

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In this Our Changing Climate environmental video essay, I look at plant-based meats like Beyond Burger and the Impossible Burger in order to understand how and why they are replacing conventional beef. Plant-based meats like the Impossible Burger seem to be trying to replacing the environmentally destructive practices of cattle factory farms which is definitely a positive. CAFOs or beef factory farms produce a lot of pollution, emissions, and are a leading cause of deforestation across the globe. Plant-based burger and meat companies like Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods seek to replace these unsustainable practices with what they claim are much more environmentally friendly meats and burgers. But Impossible Burgers and Beyond Burgers are definitely a product of food-tech optimism and are only one solution to a much larger food system problem. While Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods are doing a good job at offering viable alternatives they have a lot to work on.

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Resources:

1. Beyond Meat’s Share Price Surges on First Day of Trading (New York Times)

2. Impossible made fake meat a hot commodity. Now it could be a victim of its own success (CNN)

3. Meatless meat is becoming mainstream and it’s sparking a backlash (Vox)

4. Is the New Meat Any Better Than the Old Meat? (New York Times)

5. Is fake meat better for you, or the environment? (NBC)

6. Beyond Meat uses climate change to market fake meat substitutes. Scientists are cautious (CNBC)

7. Reducing food’s environmental impacts through producers and consumers (Poore & Nemecek)

8. Understanding Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations and Their Impact on Communities (CDC)

9. Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger Life Cycle Assessment (University of Michigan)

10. Meatless burgers vs. beefHow Beyond Meat’s environmental impact stacks up (Fast Company)

11. The Transformation of U.S. Livestock AgricultureScale, Efficiency, and Risks (USDA)

12. CAFOs UncoveredThe Untold Costs of Confined Animal Feeding Operations (Union of Concerned Scientists)

13. By the numbersGHG emissions by livestock (FAO)

14. United States Agriculture Environmental Impact (EPA)

15. The Meat Question, by the Numbers (New York Times)

16. The Strange Science of the Impossible Burger (WIRED via YouTube)

17. The Impossible Burger is probably safe. So why is everyone worked up about “heme”? (The New Food Economy)

18. Biodiversity conservationThe key is reducing meat consumption (Machovina et al)

#ImpossibleBurger #BeyondBurger #OCC