GREEN ISSUES TRANSPORT: Carbonic maceration

With food miles coming under closer scrutiny, Andrew Catchpole explains why a wine shipment from Australia does not necessarily leave a bigger carbon footprint than a wine from just across the Channel

Another Islington dinner party ends late into the night and, as lingering guests are ushered on their way, the hosts contemplate the drained bottles of organic Andalucian Viognier and biodynamic Tasmanian Nebbiolo strewn about the kitchen. Tomorrow these empties will be recycled and the remains of the celeriac risotto (courtesy of an overstock in the weekly veggie box) added to the urban composting bag for council collection. It’s been another successful low-carbon-imprint evening, helping to offset the thirsty Porsche Cayenne in the drive. Retiring to bed, Fair Trade hot chocolate in hand, sleep comes easily in the knowledge that they have done their bit to save the world.

Tongue-in-cheek this scenario may be, but it’s not so far removed from the increasing reality of consumer concern – and confusion – over the environmental impact of food and drink consumed. Apocalyptic environmental messages are delivered almost daily by the media and with the stark findings of the recent government-backed Stern Report on the Economics of Climate Change now underpinning targets aimed at reducing carbon emissions, packaging waste and other polluting aspects of businesses, such concern is unlikely to diminish. Even hard-nosed multiple retailers are being forced to address the increasing consumer demand for organic produce, plus related issues including recycling and reducing packaging waste, provenance and food miles.

So far, though, the drinks industry, with the global nature of its trade, has been given an easy ride. Wine in particular has largely ducked both the food miles debate and mounting demand for food from sustainable, environmentally sound agricultural production.

“It’s as if wine is considered to have naturally healthy, environmentally-friendly qualities by consumers who somehow divorce it from the production, packaging and transportation issues heaped on other agricultural products,” Michael Cox of Wines from Chile recently remarked. And, to be fair, set against the ongoing industrialisation of China and India, or even rush hour in London, consuming the odd bottle of wine imported from Tasmania or Andalucia hardly seems a major environmental crime.

The point is, though, that production, transportation and consumption do have a far-reaching environmental impact. And, if this comes under the spotlight in the same way as food, then the wine and drinks trade will need to respond to some tough questions. Moreover, the industry may have to bear significant extra financial costs as carbon emission quotas, energy consumption, packaging and waste are scrutinised ever more closely.

“So far consumers think of fruit and veg food miles as this is where the food-related environmental debate has been focused,” says Tara Garnet, a research fellow at Sussex University who also heads up the Food Climate Research Network. “But the debate needs to move far beyond this to include production, transport and consumption of all food and drink. If one were to be puritanical about this, wine is not a necessity and could be axed to help achieve a sustainable 60-80% reduction in carbon emissions by 2050.”

Garnet is no ranting radical. She makes the point that food (or drink) miles are, in fact, responsible for only a small part of the overall environmental cost of food and drink consumption. This may appear good news for far-flung wine producers, but the bigger picture presented by Garnet is disturbing.

In her recently compiled, exhaustive report entitled The Alcohol We Drink and its Contribution to Greenhouse Gases, Garnet concludes that food and drink consumption in the UK, directly or indirectly, accounts for 20% of all greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This figure excludes transport, which adds another 1.8% for food and drink, according to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA). Garnet’s 20% figure does include production, packaging, storage, retailing, waste disposal and the associated hospitality industry, plus domestic usage. It is in line with DEFRA’S calculations and within plus/minus 2% of similar comprehensive studies carried out in other northern European countries. Of this 20%, activity related to alcohol consumption is estimated to contribute 2.24% of the UK’s total GHG.

These figures may leave wine and drink producers and importers cold. After all, a winemaker in Chablis, Colchagua or Clare Valley can hardly be held responsible for the subsequent environmental footprint left by a notably inefficient hospitality industry, carbon-generating supermarket sector, unclean transport, ecologically damaging waste disposal or even an out-of-condition home fridge. The relevance, though, is two-fold.

Cutting emissions

First, the government, currently backed by public opinion, is now working towards targets to cut carbon emissions and other contributors to environmental pollution. Subsidies are available, for example for British brewers cutting down on carbon and waste emissions, but meeting carbon, waste and recycling targets is very likely to drive up costs (or cut down consumption) for producers, retail businesses (on- and off-trade) and consumers. And increased costs (or lower consumption) will inevitably affect the broader drinks trade as these are passed on.

Second, and closer to home, GHG production is now widely accepted to be either a contributory or main driving factor in the climate change that winemakers around the globe widely agree is affecting their vintage cycles. Producers and distributors are an integral part of a chain that fuels the problem.

For the drinks business though, and wine in particular, the picture is not all doom and gloom. Organic, biodynamic and low-environmental impact viticulture continue to increase their hold on the world’s vineyards, with many sizeable and high-end producers embracing sustainable practices on their land. Agriculture is a big polluter, in terms of water usage (a major issue in many parts of the globe, with profligate usage causing environmental problems from Valencia to the Barossa Valley), energy requirements, waste and artificial fertilisers, the production of which releases nitrogen dioxide into the atmosphere, a far worse ozone destroyer than CO2. Steps by wine producers to reduce these factors are ahead of many other agricultural sectors.

Vanya Cullen, a highly regarded wine producer in Margaret River, Western Australia, is the latest winemaker to declare her winery carbon neutral. “We first became organic, and then biodynamic and now we have offset the carbon emissions of the winery, calculated at 469 tons a year, through a tree planting scheme,” she says. “I am looking at sustainable energy supplies such as solar power, though even with grants the set up is expensive which is why I have taken the interim step of off-setting our carbon emissions.” Cullen agrees that sustainable energy is the obvious next stage towards “green” production but takes a broad view that in many ways echoes the big-picture scenario presented by Garnet.

“Once you start looking at reducing environmental impact you realise it is a very complex, inter-related process and have to view it holistically,” Cullen argues. “You can’t do it all at once but unless you take the first step you will never get there.” Challenged about the inherent contradiction that lies in producing environmentally-friendly wine and then shipping the bottles around the globe, she agrees that the producer must bear some of the responsibility. “Freight is the next step and, again, I will be looking at possible ways of off-setting the carbon footprint,” she says.

It is worth clearing up confusion over food miles in relation to transporting alcohol, especially in a climate that has seen the UK government commit to a 20% reduction in environmental and social costs of domestic food transport by 2012. The importation of a wine from Australia does not necessarily create greater carbon pollution than a wine from Europe. Carlton Young, head of DEFRA’s food and drink industry division, confirmed as much in a recent BBC Food interview: “A longer distance travelled by ship is not as damaging as lots of shorter trips by HGV.” Much of the environmental damage relating to long-distance freighting is down to the HGV journeys to and from ports at either end, which, of course, needs to be added into the equation.

Meanwhile, bulk wine shipments from Australia have increased to 27% of exports, and by shedding the weight of glass, closure and other packaging, the financial and environmental savings are obvious. For example,  Speaking at the recent Wine Industry Outlook Conference in Perth, Lawrie Stanford, the Australian Wine & Brandy Corporation’s information and analysis manager, predicted, “Export demand will rise by 33% by 2010-2011,” adding that he expected “an elevated level of bulk wine shipments in Australia’s global trading into the future”.

So, bulk wine from Australia good, small consignments collected by HGV from Burgundy bad? Unfortunately, as ever with environmental issues, it isn’t that simple. Lance Pigott, director of organic wine importer Vintage Roots adds another twist to the debate. “If you are talking about the overall environmental impact of a wine then transport probably isn’t the over-riding factor,” he says. “You have to consider energy usage in the production of that wine.” He points out that Australia’s national grid relies on coal-burning power stations, while France is largely nuclear, which may raise other concerns but leaves no carbon footprint. France, though, lags way behind California whose wineries lead the world in sustainable power. Solar and sustainable power sources provide all or some of the energy for a roll-call of wineries including Akeena, Frog’s Leap, Shafer, Kline, Mount Eden, Madrona and others. Fetzer is perhaps the best known.

Fetzer uses a combination of self-generated solar power and bought-in sustainably produced energy for its winery and administrative buildings. In addition to an energy surplus in the summer months, sold back into the grid, it runs its vehicles on bio-fuels and also uses only rainwater collected in dams for its vineyards. “We cannot say that we are completely carbon neutral because we have not converted entirely to veggie-oil fuels, plus a few other factors, but the fact that we only use renewable sources for electricity makes us have zero emissions for the large majority of the operations,” says Ann Thrupp, who is also director of the California Wine Industry Sustainability Organisation.

Green marketing

In the current climate any moves towards sustainability by the drinks industry seem worth shouting about. Unlike food, though, marketing of greener alcoholic drinks – beyond organic and biodynamic production – is almost non-existent. Of several multiple retailers approached not one responded with any coherent method or initiative to inform customers of environmental “better buys”.

As for the wine trade, Brown Forman’s Simon Legge, whose responsibility includes marketing Fetzer and Bonterra in the UK, highlights a difficulty. “Wine doesn’t usually have the big collective bucks to talk up the walk,” he says. “Sustainability is becoming a bigger issue but even with brands like Fetzer it hasn’t necessarily been a central plank of the campaign.” Fetzer did run a campaign based on sustainability from 2001 to 2003, but has now switched its energies to more events-based marketing. It would seem, as Cox speculated with regard to Chilean wines, that the consumer simply isn’t thinking of wine in these terms yet.

John McLaren, director of the Wine Institute of California, makes another valid point on the generic marketing front. “California is certainly a leader in matters of sustainability,” he says. “But until perhaps a majority of California wineries are at least working towards sustainable goals then it is difficult to promote the sustainability of the industry as a whole.”

For now then, it’s still business as usual for the majority of the drinks industry. However, few people questioned believe that growing environmental concerns will not soon begin to affect the status quo. Now is probably a very good time for the industry to start thinking about the issues that could soon far outweigh the carbon costs or food miles of shipping a bottle of wine.

© db January 2007