Environmental Benefits of Novel Nonhuman Food Inputs to Salmon Feeds

Global population growth and changing diets increase the importance, and challenges, of reducing the environmental impacts of food production. Farmed seafood is a relatively efficient way to produce protein and has already overtaken wild fisheries. The use of protein-rich food crops, such as soy, in...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Environmental science & technology 2019-02, Vol.53 (4), p.1967-1975
Main Authors: Couture, Jessica L, Geyer, Roland, Hansen, Jon Øvrum, Kuczenski, Brandon, Øverland, Margareth, Palazzo, Joseph, Sahlmann, Christian, Lenihan, Hunter
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Aquaculture
Aquaculture feeds
Bacteria
Carbon dioxide
Climate change
Environmental impact
Fish
Fish meal
Fisheries
Food
Food production
Indicators
Industrial production
Ingredients
Life cycle analysis
Life cycle assessment
Life cycles
Meals
Methanotrophic bacteria
Oils & fats
Plant-based foods
Population growth
Primary production
Protein sources
Proteins
Salmon
Seafood
Soy products
Sustainability
Sustainable agriculture
Yeast
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Summary:Global population growth and changing diets increase the importance, and challenges, of reducing the environmental impacts of food production. Farmed seafood is a relatively efficient way to produce protein and has already overtaken wild fisheries. The use of protein-rich food crops, such as soy, instead of fishmeal in aquaculture feed diverts these important protein sources away from direct human consumption and creates new environmental challenges. Single cell proteins (SCPs), including bacteria and yeast, have recently emerged as replacements for plant-based proteins in salmon feeds. Attributional life cycle assessment is used to compare salmon feeds based on protein from soy, methanotrophic bacteria, and yeast ingredients. All ingredients are modeled at the industrial production scale and compared based on seven resource use and emissions indicators. Yeast protein concentrate showed drastically lower impacts in all categories compared to soy protein concentrate. Bacteria meal also had lower impacts than soy protein concentrate for five of the seven indicators. When these target meals were incorporated into complete feeds the relative trends remain fairly constant, but benefits of the novel ingredients are dampened by high impacts from the nontarget ingredients. Particularly, primary production requirements (PPR) are about equal and constant across all feeds for both analyses since PPR was driven by fishmeal and oil. The bacteria-based feed has the highest climate change impacts due to the use of methane to feed the bacteria who then release carbon dioxide. Overall, the results of this study suggest that incorporating SCP ingredients into salmon feeds can help reduce the environmental impacts of salmon production. Continued improvements in SCP production would further increase the sustainability of salmon farming.
ISSN:0013-936X
1520-5851
DOI:10.1021/acs.est.8b03832