
Making Protein Using Air, Water, Electricity, and Microbes - scribu
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jun/29/plan-to-sell-50m-meals-electricity-water-air-solar-foods
======
incompatible
Duplicate:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20311235](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20311235)

~~~
dang
On HN we only count a post as a duplicate if the story has had significant
attention; that one maybe doesn't quite clear the bar.

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tuukkah
This is a new alternative to our current, photosynthesis-based food chain. For
those who think it's a scam, consider that they have already convinced the
European Space Agency to be a partner:
[https://www.forbes.com/sites/lanabandoim/2018/11/26/how-a-
st...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/lanabandoim/2018/11/26/how-a-startup-
plans-to-make-edible-protein-from-air-and-electricity/)

And for those who think the headline is misleading: It's comparable to saying
that plant protein comes from sun+air+water. They first build a small
bioreactor with some microbes inside but after that the input is (mostly?) air
(including carbon dioxide and nitrogen), electricity (preferably from solar)
and a little water, and the output "looks and tastes like wheat flour, with
50% protein content and 5–10 % fat and 20–25 % carbs."
[https://solarfoods.fi/bioprocess/](https://solarfoods.fi/bioprocess/)

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burlesona
A much more detailed description can be found on the related opinion piece
here:
[https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/31/electr...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/31/electric-
food-sci-fi-diet-planet-food-animals-environment)

The process involves using microbes seeded with a bunch of minerals in
addition to the air, water, and electricity, so this headline oversimplifies
things quite a bit.

Meanwhile the opinion piece also makes the case for why anyone should care: in
short, figuring out ways to grow food in radically less space - and in
particular, using barren land (the article says sunny deserts would be ideal
for this method) - is key to reversing significant environmental harm done by
industrial agriculture.

^ that’s a summary of the opinion piece, I don’t have a lot of knowledge or
opinion in this area.

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mlinksva
Wonder how this production mechanism pencils out as a way to feed everyone for
years without sun, i.e., relative to other options explored in
[https://www.appropedia.org/Feeding_Everyone_No_Matter_What](https://www.appropedia.org/Feeding_Everyone_No_Matter_What)

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dlhavema
and microbes. Is it pure clickbait to leave off the most vital part of this
reaction?

~~~
dang
OK, we've added microbes to the title above. An Oxford comma too!

~~~
tuukkah
I wouldn't include the microbes in the list of ingredients since the process
grows the microbes. I would suggest "Making Protein _From_ Air, Water, and
Electricity"

~~~
dang
We'll get even more complaints if we say 'from' instead of 'using'.

Looking at the article it seems like the microbes predate the process?

~~~
tuukkah
Yes, but they are the "machine" (that doesn't deplete). The inputs are air,
water and electricity just as the title says.

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morphle
Original paper and the other papers by the authors (leading up to the
resulting startup)

[1] [https://sci-hub.tw/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.07.089#](https://sci-
hub.tw/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.07.089#)

[2]
[https://scholar.google.nl/citations?hl=en&user=6tlAHpQAAAAJ&...](https://scholar.google.nl/citations?hl=en&user=6tlAHpQAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate)

[3]
[https://scholar.google.nl/citations?hl=en&user=F4_L9CYAAAAJ&...](https://scholar.google.nl/citations?hl=en&user=F4_L9CYAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate)

~~~
morphle
I would say its at least 3800 million years old

[https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-
entertainment/tv/news/blu...](https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-
entertainment/tv/news/blue-planet-2-ii-bbc-one-the-deep-episode-2-iplayer-
hydrothermal-vents-sir-david-attenborough-a8033936.html)

[https://www.sciencealert.com/the-earliest-signs-of-life-
on-l...](https://www.sciencealert.com/the-earliest-signs-of-life-on-land-have-
been-found-in-3-48-billion-year-old-australian-rocks)

~~~
morphle
What is harder to locate in the articles, science papers and video is what
precise bacterium or bacteria makes the Solein?

~~~
fpga_user
Replying to this comment -
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20257882](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20257882)

How do you get the board for $113? Has the price increased since?

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ars
"and fed with carbon dioxide and hydrogen bubbles"

This is nonsense. Protein needs nitrogen. Maybe they get it from air, but I
suspect this isn't real.

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tuukkah
It's real, but the marketing slogan doesn't include all the details mentioned
here: "Their only ingredients are hydrogen-oxidising bacteria, electricity
from solar panels, a small amount of water, carbon dioxide drawn from the air,
_nitrogen_ and trace quantities of minerals such as calcium, sodium, potassium
and zinc."
[https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/31/electr...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/31/electric-
food-sci-fi-diet-planet-food-animals-environment)

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FZ1
You sort of missed the LIVING MICROBES part of the article. Which is where the
uh, PROTEIN comes from ... smh ...

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acjohnson55
Soylent Green is people!

