California startup unveils new ‘butter’ made from carbon dioxide that 'tastes just like dairy'

Humans have had a compelling affinity for fatty foods for around four million years, which contributes to the trend where the majority of people still choose animal products instead of their vegan alternatives.

This choice places high expectations on the flavour of plant-based foods. Now, a California-based startup called Savor is bent on changing this reality by creating animal-free butter from carbon dioxide, which, based on the company's claims, "tastes just like dairy butter."

Savor’s butter is primarily made of fat—a component that makes consumers long for cheeseburgers and other similar food items.

‘Butter’ made from carbon dioxide

Instead of relying on livestock to produce the fat, Savor’s team uses a thermochemical process to draw out carbon dioxide from the air and eventually blend it with hydrogen and oxygen to produce synthetic fat.

This synthetic fat is then made into butter by adding water, an emulsifier, beta-carotene for colour, and rosemary oil for flavour. Kathleen Alexander, Savor’s chief technology officer, told New Scientist’s Madeleine Cuff, “It tastes like butter.”

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Informal taste panels with tens of people have already been held, and Alexander communicated to the Guardian’s Mariam Amini that they “expect to perform a more formal panel as part of our commercialisation and scale-up efforts.”

Bill Gates, billionaire and former Microsoft CEO who invested in the company, also tried their creation and wrote in a blog post earlier this year, “I couldn’t believe I wasn’t eating real butter.” He added, “The burger came close, too.”

Livestock industry's share in greenhouse emissions??

In December, a team of researchers, including Alexander, published a report in the journal Nature Sustainability exploring food production without agriculture. This technique could significantly reduce the environmental footprint of food systems.

According to an analysis by the Breakthrough Institute, the livestock industry contributes 11.1 to 19.6 percent of human-made greenhouse gas emissions. Lowering animal product consumption could reduce humanity’s environmental impact. Gates writes that “our plan can’t be to simply hope that people give up foods they crave.”

By creating butter using carbon rather than emitting it, Savor aims to address both taste and environmental concerns. The Nature Sustainability report states that the synthetic fat’s carbon footprint is less than 0.8 grams of CO2 equivalent per calorie, compared to 2.4 grams for real unsalted butter.

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Synthetic foods could also free up land for conservation and carbon storage. Gates claims Savor’s process uses less than one-thousandth of the water used in traditional agriculture. Savor is also working on synthetic fat alternatives for palm and coconut oil.

Savor faces challenges such as reducing product prices and minimising disruptions to agricultural workers. They are working on getting regulatory approval in the United States.?

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Alexander told New Scientist, “We want to engage with people about why we think it is good for the planet. The land use, and all of that stuff, is really important. But actually, you just have to make food that tastes really good.”

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