Water measures for greater sustainability in winery

It takes a lot of water to make a glass of wine. But that amount is already reducing in our Marlborough winery, and will diminish even more as we get the measure of water usage.

Our commitment to sustainability is all-encompassing, and the use of water in our winery has become one of the target areas for improvement. We have installed a number of water meters on site to get a better view of exactly where the water goes, so that we can identify the best ways to save.

Two activities account for the lion’s share of water use in the winery:

• Cleaning and hygiene. This includes flushing out tanks and pipes, cleaning equipment as well as the outside of wine tanks and the floor.
• The refrigeration plant that controls the temperature of our wine tanks use water evaporators.

Through more detailed measurement, we discovered that a surprisingly large portion of our total water use was to clean the crossflow filter used to get wine ready for bottling. We put our heads together and devised a way to reduce that amount by 20% without compromising the effectiveness of the filter in any way.

Our winery staff are continuing to analyse areas where we can make further savings. Our aim is to reduce our already relatively efficient total water usage by at least another 17% within the next three years.