
Electric food – the new sci-fi diet that could save our planet - philipkglass
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/31/electric-food-sci-fi-diet-planet-food-animals-environment
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philipkglass
I've been reading about various paths from chemotrophic organisms to human-
edible food for a long time, mostly as an offshoot of my interest in human
deep space exploration. Most of the efforts I've read about start with
methanotrophs, but it seems like it could be more energetically efficient to
start with hydrogen. Starting with hydrogen also simplifies the hardware since
you don't need a separate reactor to combine hydrogen and carbon dioxide.

The reason to look into chemotrophic pathways is because photosynthesis under
artificial lighting is _really_ inefficient, even with modern LED lights.
Vertical farming is great for making premium-quality salad greens and herbs,
but absurdly expensive and resource-intensive for providing all of a person's
food. Food production that starts with chemotrophs and renewable hydrogen
instead of phototrophs and renewable lighting has the potential to deliver
much more nutrition per-dollar and per-acre, while still delivering many of
the benefits touted by vertical farming (low water use, less long-distance
transportation of food, using land that is otherwise unsuited for
agriculture).

