Finland-based food business Fazer Group has teamed up with Solar Foods, which claims to have developed a cost-effective, carbon-neutral protein.
Trademarked as Solein, Solar Foods’ powder needs no soil, land or sugar for production. Fazer Group CEO Christoph Vitzthum said the partnership would take the company a step closer to its core sustainability goal of halving emissions by 2030.
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The powder is made using CO2, water, micronutrients and electricity. Solar Foods CEO and co-founder Pasi Vainikka told just-food the powder can be used as either a protein addition or replacement in foods such as packet soups, pasta and bread, or in newer meat and dairy alternatives, where it could be a substitute for pea, soy and other plant proteins.
With a pilot production plant already running, Vainikka aims to have EU Novel Food regulatory approval by the second half of 2021. At scale, he said output will hit 800 kilos of powder per hour. For context, the average Irish cow, given two to three years to mature, produces about 210 kilos of meat.
Looking ahead, Vainikka said the powder, which the company says contains all the necessary amino acids, could also be used as a scalable growth medium component for cultured proteins. Cultured meat, fish and dairy start-ups take cells from live animals and replicate them in fermentation tanks filled with growth medium to produce slaughter-free foods.
Fazer’s partnership with Solar Foods comes with financing of EUR3.5m in convertible loans for continuing research and development. The other investors are Holdix, Turret and Lifeline Ventures. The current investment round builds on seed funding already provided by Lifeline Ventures last year.
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