Just as there is a growing realization that electric cars are the best way for individuals to cut their carbon emissions, there is a similar movement that recognizes eating beef is not an environmentally sound thing to do.
Impossible Foods is one of several companies that is working to bring plant based meat substitutes to market. Others include Israeli start ups like Super Meat, Future Meat Technologies, and Meat the Future. In addition to beef alternatives, Super Meat is hard at work on plant based substitutes for chicken.
In 2014, Impossible Foods submitted its hamburger alternative to the US, Food and Drug Administration FDA). Impossible Foods uses a little used substance known as leghemoglobin, which is found in the roots of the soybean plant.
Researchers at the company found adding it to their meat substitutes gave them a texture similar to meat. Hemoglobin, when used in a meat substitute, makes the concoction juicy like real beef.
Because leghemoglobin is not used in other foods, the FDA had no existing information about it to draw from so it fed massive quantities of leghemoglobin to lab rats to see what happened. Finally they concluded that company’s plant-based meat substitute is “generally recognized as safe” for human consumption.
A report by The Guardian says, “A vegan diet is probably the single biggest way to reduce your impact on planet Earth, not just greenhouse gases, but global acidification, eutrophication, land use, and water use,” wrote lead author Joseph Poore of the University of Oxford.
Reference:- The Guardian, ScienceDirect, Cleantehnica