In this research project the external costs of RESPECTfarms’ locally produced cultivated meat product and three conventional meat products (chicken meat, pig meat and dairy cow meat, produced in the Netherlands) are assessed. The True Cost Assessment (TCA) method is followed. This method currently includes natural, social and human capital, and excludes economic capital.
CE Delft conducted this study together with Wageningen Economic Research (WEcR). CE Delft has modeled cultivated meat production using data from RESPECTfarms. This yielded the environmental results needed to calculate natural capital.
All products are valued for a 2030 scenario, the RESPECTfarms technology is assumed to be developed to TRL7. Energy used on the farms is partly generated by Photo Voltaic (PV) panels on stable roofs and partly purchased from the grid with the expected average energy mix in the Netherlands in 2030 (which has a higher share of sustainable generated energy than the current average mix).
In the 2030 scenario, the total external costs of the locally produced cultivated meat are assessed to be lower compared to the three conventional meat products.
In 2030 it is estimated that a switch from Dutch conventional chicken meat, pig meat, and dairy meat production to RESPECTfarms’ locally produced cultivated meat production will probably:
Within the human health capital no clear trend in external costs can be made when shifting from conventional meat to cultivated meat, because impact studies are still limited. External costs on economic capital are not assessed since currently no assessment method has been developed.
The report can be found here.