Thanks to innovations in food science and agriculture, the world is producing more food than ever before. While this has significantly reduced global hunger since the 1970s, it has impacted the environment; in 2023, food production generated about 26 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, according to Our World in Data.
Now scientists at the Finnish startup Solar Foods are turning air and electricity into food. The result? A mustard-colored protein powder made from naturally occurring microbes that could reshape how the world is fed.
Inside a bioreactor, a single microbe plucked from the Finnish dirt is fed a cocktail of carbon dioxide, nitrogen, calcium, phosphorus, and potassium. Renewable electricity powers the process, which the company says is "20 times more efficient than photosynthesis," and accelerates the growth of the microorganism into a protein-rich slurry.
