Upgrading agrifood co-products via solid fermentation yields environmental benefits under specific conditions only

Area of Science:

• Environmental Science
• Biotechnology
• Sustainable Food Systems

Background:

• Growing interest in converting residual biomass into edible ingredients to reduce food system environmental impacts.
• Current waste-to-nutrition technologies often rely on novel methods with unclear environmental benefits and resource constraints.

Purpose of the Study:

• To quantify the environmental impacts of waste-to-nutrition pathways, specifically using solid-state fermentation (SSF) to upgrade agrifood co-products.
• To assess the viability of SSF for producing edible ingredients from biomass, considering various market applications (feed, food, energy).

Main Methods:

• Utilized process-based consequential life cycle analysis (LCA).
• Incorporated uncertainty assessment and biomass resource estimation.
• Evaluated the environmental performance of SSF against displaced food and feed baskets.

Main Results:

• Enhancing feed protein via SSF to reduce soybean meal demand did not compensate for climate change, water depletion, and land use burdens.
• SSF outperformed energy valorization for most environmental impacts but was less effective for climate change mitigation.
• SSF demonstrated overall environmental benefits when targeting food markets compared to feed or energy services.

Conclusions:

• The environmental benefits of waste-to-nutrition pathways, like SSF, are highly dependent on the specific application and the displaced products.
• Methodological harmonization is crucial for accurately assessing the potential of novel ingredients derived from biomass transformation.
• System boundaries and displaced product choices significantly influence the LCA outcomes for bio-based ingredients.