"Impossible Burger at Hell's Kitchen, Minneapolis" by Tony Webster is licensed under CC BY 2.0

"Already a $19.5 billion market, alternative proteins are expected to capture 10 percent of the global meat market within 15 years, according to a report released in February by Euromonitor. (Still, it said, conventional meat will grow faster than meat alternatives over the next four years.)

"From a resource efficiency standpoint — making the highest and best use of feedstocks and materials — the Impossible burger requires 87 percent less water, 96 percent less land and produces 89 percent fewer greenhouse gas emissions than an equivalent-sized beef burger, according to its life-cycle analysis (LCA) conducted by metrics firm Quantis. 

"But don’t write off beef’s environmental impacts too quickly. Although a plant-rich diet is ranked No. 4 on Project Drawdown’s list of 100 solutions to reverse global warming, there is a growing case for cattle grazing as a regenerative, carbon-sequestering approach to land management."