16 minute read
Over-inflated? Are Australian wine producers keen to capture carbon from fermentation?
Sustainability
Over-inflated?
Are Australian wine producers keen to capture carbon from fermentation?
Winery operations manager for Taylors Wines, Clinton Taylor.
Although carbon dioxide emissions from fermentation are currently excluded from carbon calculators for the wine industry, this hasn’t stopped experimentation in capturing and sequestering such emissions. As previously reported in the Grapegrower & Winemaker, one such winery to experiment in this area is Spanish-based Familia Torres which announced late last year it had designed a system to capture and reuse the CO₂ from fermentation tanks at its Pacs del Penedès winery. Sonya Logan spoke with four Australian wineries to gauge their current and future interest in such systems as they seek to improve on their environmental performance.
There are two schools of thought when it comes to the question of what to do about carbon emissions from fermentation. One is nothing given that the CO₂ is captured from the atmosphere by vines so its impact on the overall production of wine is net zero; hence, fermentation emissions are currently not included in carbon calculators for wine. The other view is that CO₂ emissions are not trivial – UC Davis professor Roger Boulton has described them as being five times more concentrated than planes and cars – and should be sequestered by wineries.
The fact is, more substantial reductions in emissions are possible in other aspects of the wine production process. In 2015, The Australian Wine Research Institute conducted a life cycle assessment of the environmental impacts associated with the production of Australian wine which drew on data collected from members of Entwine, the predecessor to the industry’s national sustainability program Sustainable Winegrowing Australia. The analysis calculated the average carbon footprint (CF) for Australian wine was 1.16kg CO₂e per litre (Abbott et al. 2016). Packaging, transport and energy use in vineyards and wineries were the biggest contributors to this tally. The AWRI’s investigation showed the carbon contributions from the act of making wine specifically comprised 17% of the wine sector’s CF, with electricity the largest contributor to this total (at 82% of winemaking emissions). In an article published in the September 2020 issue of the Grapegrower & Winemaker, Smart et al. (2020) stated fermentation resulted in carbon dioxide emissions of 0.11kg CO₂e/L — or 9.5% of the average carbon footprint of Australian wine.
“If these fermentation emissions were captured and used to eliminate importation of carbon dioxide into wineries, it could result in a 9.5% reduction in carbon emissions associated with Australian domestic bottled wine (representing more than half of the emissions associated with winemaking),” the authors stated, adding, “sequestration of fermentation emissions present a significant mitigation opportunity”. While capturing carbon emissions from barrel fermentation is likely to remain impractical for some time, the technology already exists to harvest the gas emitted from fermentation in tanks. What happens to the gas after that is where the technology is evolving. As previously reported in the Grapegrower & Winemaker, one wine producer to take advantage of the innovations in this area is Spain’s Familia Torres where tanks have been adapted to enable the CO₂ produced during fermentation to be collected in large balloons positioned above them. The gas is then compressed and transferred to another tank where it is stored for use as an inert gas when filling tanks. Whilst many of Australia’s wine producers have taken steps to identify and reduce their carbon footprint, is capturing the carbon emitted during the fermentation process in their sights? One Australian winery that regularly assesses its CO₂ emissions is Tamburlaine Organic Wines. The company owns two wineries — its original 500t winery in the Hunter Valley and the much larger
Mark Davidson
Familia Torres has designed an innovative system to capture and reuse the CO₂ from its fermentation tanks at its Pacs del Penedès facility in Spain. As wine ferments and releases CO₂, the gas is captured inside balloons which inflate. The gas is then compressed to a pressure that allows it to be transferred to a storage tank for reuse later as an inert gas when filling tanks.
12,000t winery at Cudal in Orange which it acquired in 2020. Tamburlaine’s managing director and head of grape and wine production Mark Davidson said the results of these calculations were assessed by a team of staff at least twice a year. The company is also considering becoming certified under the Federal Government’s Climate Active initiative — a certification only awarded to businesses and organisations that have achieved net zero emissions. Tamburlaine has also been a member of an international carbon trade exchange for more than a decade and buys offsets to cover its emissions.
Davidson says his company has made numerous decisions over the last 10 years or so to improve its operations and upgrade equipment in pursuit of reducing power and inputs. This has included the installation of solar technologies and upgrades to lighting and diesel farm equipment. He says these decisions have resulted in “large improvements” in its CO₂ emissions as a result. “Future projects include ongoing process and equipment upgrades, replacing ‘black’ electricity purchase with renewable or carbon neutral supply and, possibly, carbon farming,” he explains. With such a focus on reducing its carbon emissions, has Tamburlaine considered the prospect of capturing its output from fermentation? “It seems like a logical and very good idea,” admits Davidson. “We would like to capture the CO₂ from ferments and use it to replace purchased CO₂ used for both inert gas usage in wine transfer, ullage management and for sparkling wine carbonation.
“We are currently investigating it. We estimate our current CO₂ emissions from fermentation to be about 10% of our total company carbon footprint. “Regardless of the current determination to exclude ferment CO₂ emissions from CF assessments, it would seem reasonable that CO₂ emissions from fermentation that can be captured and reused relatively easily, should be,” Davidson continues. “There are cost and environmental advantages if this can be achieved with a reasonable payback period.” So what would be the tipping point for the idea to become a reality? “We still need to assess the available technology more fully, for example, is it suitable for outdoor installations such as at our Cudal winery, estimate the capital investment necessary to capture the required volume of CO₂ and then assess the ROI,” Davidson explains. “Some degree of government support for this kind of project would certainly assist moving this up the priority list and help make the likely ROI more attractive. “It appears to be suitable to replace part of the inert gas usage in wine transfer and ullage management with minimal filtration. However, we need more information on the level of filtration required for it to be used for sparging and carbonation purposes,” he adds. Like Tamburlaine, Taylors Wines is watching developments in fermentation carbon capture technology with a keen interest.
“We are certainly keeping an eye on it as part of our overall work to reduce our total emissions,” says Clinton Taylor, winery operations manager for Taylors Wines, which recently became the first independent Australian winery to become a signatory to the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi). As the name suggests, the initiative enables businesses to set emissions reduction targets in line with science and the family-owned winery has set a target to achieve at 50% reduction in its scope 1 and scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.
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Clinton Taylor
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Environmental advantages
Taylor says that although the winery has not made any moves to implement carbon capture from fermentation, the environmental advantages in doing so were evident. “Anything we can do to capture and prevent carbon from being emitted into the atmosphere is a worthwhile endeavour. Innovative tactics like this contribute to the many ways wineries could reduce their emissions to be carbon zero by 2050,” says Taylor, alluding to the Australian wine industry’s goal to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 as part of Australian Grape & Wine and Wine Australia’s ‘Vision 2050’ plan. “The more opportunities and options we have, the better.
“We can model the amount of carbon emitted during the fermentation process as part of our overall carbon footprint, but capturing it and directing it to various uses will come down to what percentage of the total emissions could be captured,” Taylor continues. “There are still many questions about how this system could fit in with our current workflow at the winery. We need to understand a bit more about how we could use the emissions as there are many options for how the CO₂ could be utilised and the systems needed to make this happen. It will also take more understanding of how the system could integrate with the current infrastructure at the winery.” Taylors Wines has maintained ISO 14001 Certification for its environmental management system (EMS) for more than a decade. Clinton Taylor says the EMS has enabled the company to identify and control its impacts on the environment across the business and establish a framework for continual improvements. Improvements in the winery to date have included the implementation of energyefficient tank refrigeration and barrel hall temperature control. Although Victoria’s oldest family-owned winery, Tahbilk, has been measuring its CO₂ emissions since 2012 at both a product and organisation level, and consequently implemented various measures to reduce them, the company is yet to consider the possibility of capturing CO₂ from fermentation tanks at its two wineries in the Nagambie Lakes region. For Tahbilk, the incentive for such an investment hasn’t materialised.
“It is something we are aware of,” says Hayley Purbrick, environment manager for Tahbilk. “It appears to be a hot topic of conversation currently. “Given fermentation is a process of carbon release — one molecule of sugar releases two molecules of ethanol and two molecules of CO₂ — no doubt there is some impact on CO₂ emissions,” she continues. “My gut says the impact is nominal when compared to other sources of CO₂ in the production process. “I am sure there could be benefits in reusing CO₂ as it would technically mean you shouldn’t have to purchase CO₂ to use at different stages of the winemaking/ bottling process.” But Purbrick conceded that capturing fermentation emissions and using them elsewhere around the winery sounded “very complicated”. Asked what it might take for Tahbilk to be prompted to install a system for capturing CO₂ emissions from fermentation, Purbrick says “an understanding of the measurable factors for CO₂ emissions currently by the fermentation process which is reliable and accurate”.
“This would enable us to get a picture of the size of the problem, if there is one. Then we could act as appropriate which would include costing any infrastructure required.” While carbon capture from fermentation might be currently on the back burner at Tahbilk, the company continues to implement other measures to reduce its CO₂ emissions. Since 2013, it has reduced emissions by 45% across the organisation, including its 2500t Tahbilk winery and its 12,000t subsidiary winery Moncrieffs in Nagambie, with the help of 160ha of native revegetation on its estate vineyards and the purchase of offsite carbon credits. It is the only winery in Australia accredited carboNZero at a product and organisation level. Purbrick says assessments of the wine company’s CO₂ emissions have shown that 60% of its greenhouse gas emissions are due to energy consumption. This has seen Tahbilk focus its carbon-reduction activities on initiatives that reduce its energy consumption, such as upgrading machinery and equipment and reducing its reliance on non-renewable sources by introducing solar. Among the other actions Tahbilk has taken to reduce its CF from winery
Environment manager for Tahbilk, Hayley Purbrick.
Clinton Taylor
Senior winemaker for the Brown Family Wine Group, Cate Looney.
activities is the use of heat reflective paint, replacing chiller units, eliminating polystyrene packaging and enrolling staff in LEAN training programs. Three years ago, the company also took the step of employing an environment and vineyard research analyst. John Brown was ahead of his time when, many years ago, he installed a passive inert gas system to capture CO2 from white wine fermentation tanks at the Brown Brothers winery at Milawa, Victoria. Servicing more than 300 tanks, the system holds the gas and redistributes it around the winery. Although it needs topping up outside of vintage to ensure gas supply is maintained to all tanks, senior winemaker for the Brown Family Wine Group, Cate Looney, says reducing the need to purchase gas is welcome. “Purchasing CO₂ is expensive so any upcycling a winery can make will have environmental benefits and benefits to their bottom line,” Looney says. The Brown Family Wine Group has been a member of Sustainable Winegrowing Australia (SWA) for a couple of years now and is currently going through the process of benchmarking itself against other members in the industry to get a good understanding of where the company can best concentrate its efforts to improve its environmental, social and economic sustainability. Looney says that although the company doesn’t currently measure its CO₂ emissions, it plans to do so as part of its SWA certification which was expected to be achieved in mid-2023.
She says that although the idea of capturing CO₂ emissions from the fermentation process is a great idea, the justification for the infrastructure needed to set it up is undermined by the fact that fermentation only happens “in a small part of the year”. “The brewing industry that ferments all year round are making some really good gains in this area,” she offers by comparison.
References
Abbott, T.; Longbottom, M.; Wilkes, E. and Johnson, D. (2016) Assessing the environmental credentials of Australian wine. Wine & Viticulture Journal 31(1):35-37. Smart, R.; Bruer, D.; Collins, C.; Corsi, A.; Jeffrey, I.; Karantonis, C.; Lockshin, L. and Muhlack, R. (2020) Towards Australian grape and wine industry carbon neutrality…the possible dream. Australian & New Zealand Grapegrower & Winemaker 680:100-105
Industry remembers low carbon wine pioneer: Vale Graham Dixon
South Australian biochemist Graham Dixon is being remembered as a pioneer of low carbon wine and an advocate for tackling poverty overseas. Graham, who began his winemaking career at Penfolds in the Barossa Valley, died in April after undergoing a lung transplant at Sydney’s St Vincent’s Hospital. Known for his quirky humour and inventive mind, Graham was busy in recent years perfecting a carbon capture process for white winemaking. Low Carbon Wine, as he named it, is made by recycling carbon dioxide emitted during fermentation, and by returning aromas captured from the CO₂ stream back into the wine.
Graham’s aim was to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of wineries globally by reducing the need for energyintensive refrigeration during vintage to retain beneficial volatile aroma compounds, and by capturing the CO₂ produced through fermentation. He was keen to show the wine industry that carbon capture equipment could be “cheap and low tech” and beneficial not only for the planet, but for wine companies’ budgets. Graham had worked on the process in Europe prior to COVID and was trialling the technology at the Australian Wine Research Institute in Adelaide.
In his words: “We have already established that low carbon wine is comparable to conventionally made white wine, but with a nuance of an aroma signature discernible by experienced tasters. The nuance can be amplified by increasing the time between capturing and returning the volatiles to the ferment. We think this is because the extra time allows for esterification of some aroma compounds.” Graham, who was a prominent member of the South Australian chapter of Mensa, studied microbial genetics at Flinders University and worked in diverse scientific fields, from experimental commercial cheesemaking with the CSIRO, to quality assurance in the fruit juice and wine industries. He spent many years in Eastern Europe, working with the World Bank in places such as Moldova, helping to improve winemaking practices and broaden countries’ wine export markets. Graham was a passionate believer in the potential for high quality wine industries to help steer struggling nations out of poverty. While Graham was an active and healthy man, over the past year he had suffered from a debilitating and life-threatening lung condition. Doctors hoped a lung transplant would extend his life, but, devastatingly, Graham died in hospital surrounded by family on April 22. Graham Dixon is remembered by his loving wife, Iuliana, his four daughters, Robyn, Sally, Cobi and Georgia, and his six grandchildren, who share his love of nature and insatiable curiosity.
