How do so-called alternative wine packagings compare?

Last week I wrote about the idea that Wine packaging is going to change, sooner rather than later. This is simply because glass bottles are the wine industry’s biggest contributor to Global Climate Change — it makes up at least two-thirds of the so-called “carbon footprint”. Therefore, it is the part that most needs to change if the industry is going to make a move towards sustainability.

The obvious follow-up question is then: what are the package options, and how do they stack up against each other? This is what I will cover here, by looking at each type.

It is important to start by noting that it is both the manufacture and the transport of the bottles that create the issue — glass bottles involve a lot of heat to be made, and they are heavy to transport; and both of these produce a lot of carbon emissions. This is why we need to consider alternatives to using new (standard) bottles for every wine vintage.  Mind you, the current shortages of glass bottles may force us anyway (Spiralling costs are blowing wine buying rules ‘out of the water’).

Refilling your own bottles

To me, it is obvious that we should start with this option, as re-use is always superior to recycling. We also get control of a lot of the transport, since we do it ourselves, and we decide what we are going to store our wine in (and thus drink it from). The idea is for us to go ourselves to the retailer (or producer), and have them fill up the containers we bring with us. Obviously, if these are glass bottles then they should be ones that we have used before, and then thoroughly cleaned, rather than us bringing new ones each time.

There is nothing intrinsically new about this idea, since some parts of the world already do this for supermarket hygiene products like soap and shampoo. There are already a number of such systems currently being used for alcohol, although they seem to exist only in retailers principally designed for this purpose. One obvious issue for retailers is the floor space required for a refill station; and deciding on a suitable bottle closure is not straightforward either (And now for something completely different).

Nevertheless, a couple of examples of refill bottling schemes for spirits were discussed at the recent Vinexposium (What’s the future of alternative wine packaging?). At the moment, one scheme has "around 20% of people return the bottle to be refilled", although 80% is the target. As an example for a winery, LJ Crafted Wines has patented a device that’s inserted into the barrel, from which they sell all their wines directly. It takes 3-4 months to sell the wine, so it needs to be kept fresh in the opened barrel for that length of time. * There is also an Australian company called ReWine, which uses its own versions of Flextanks to transport wine in large quantities directly from a winery to its warehouse facilities, to then subdivide into a unique barrel system for customers to have their bottles filled and refilled, dispensed under nitrogen with 30% CO2 (And now for something completely different). It also uses a Nova Twist closure, because you can’t re-use a screw-cap.

Return bottles to be re-used

The obvious next alternative is to have the producers and retailers re-fill the used bottles. That is, the bottles are returned to the retailer, and the producer cleans and re-uses them. Otherwise, it is basically the same as the previous section. This seems a bit more likely in practice, than having us re-fill them ourselves, as we simply return them the next time we visit the retailer. Indeed, a recent Rabobank report suggests that returnable, refillable bottles are not only the most sustainable packaging solution, they could also become the most economical.

At the moment, here is Sweden we have returnable glass bottles for many brands of beer (The change at Systembolaget that many missed). The bottles are marked as returnable, and we pay a small refundable deposit on them. Sadly, of the 32.6 million liters sold in 2021, an estimated 86% of the bottles were not returned. This system obviously needs improvement, before being applied to wine bottles.

There is nothing unusual about such a system, of course, in many places around the world. However, in places like California, many aluminum, plastic and glass containers have a refundable recycling fee, but many don’t — whether the bottle fee applies depends as much on what the bottle holds as what it’s made of. Nevertheless, the California bottle fee is to apply to wine and spirits in 2024; and a similar Proposed container deposit scheme expansion rattles NSW wine industry.

PET bottles and aluminium cans

I might as well lump these two together, even though some drinkers might feel that there is a psychological difference in drinking from each of them. The idea, however, in both cases, is that these are food-grade containers (just like glass), and that they require much less energy to produce, and they can be recycled conveniently (but not re-used, as can glass). Perhaps the most practical suggestion is that these can be used for wine that will be consumed in the shorter term than we might expect for glass bottles (up to a year?); and let’s face it, that is actually most wines.

As noted above, here in Sweden we pay a deposit for all of these containers, whether from the supermarket or an alcohol retailer. That deposit is credited to us when we next visit a supermarket, as there are machines conveniently placed next to the entrances. We get a receipt, which we can cash in the supermarket, or have credited to our supermarket bill at the check-out. I noted last week that the Nordic retailers are leading the way forward (Can the Nordic monopolies turn the drinks world green?), and this is one of the ways.

The issue here, of course, will be to get wine drinkers to drink from a can (just like beer drinkers), or be persuaded that a PET bottle can contain high-quality wine. This sort of thing can be done, of course, as the wine-makers of Clare Valley (in South Australia) showed, when they unilaterally switched from corks to screw-caps for their 2000 vintage (Clare Valley celebrates 20 years of the screwcap revolution). Indeed, it has been reported that cans saw the greatest increase as a proportion of wine packaging market in the 2010s (A changing environment for wine packaging).

In this regard, Garçon Wines, based in the U.K., has been using flat bottles made from pre-existing and recycled PET plastic, with some success (And now for something completely different). A similar bottle has been developed in Australia, by Packamama (Eco-bottle targets wine industry’s carbon hotspot). Also, it has been reported that Miguel Torres Chile will switch to flat PET bottles in Sweden.

Paper bottles

I have put this in a separate grouping because of potential issues with recycling; but otherwise this is simply part of the previous group. There are different variants for "aseptic cartons", from waxed cardboard boxes, such we use for milk or cream, to more sophisticated systems. Some people are excited by examples of this option (Kate Hawkings on the future of alternative wine packaging):

it’s a bag-in-box but in the shape of a normal wine bottle. Made from 94% recycled (and recyclable) paperboard with a recyclable liner, it’s around a fifth the weight of a glass bottle, has a sixth of its carbon footprint and, crucially, is pleasingly tactile to use and to hold.

The issue, for me, is the extent to which cardboard / paper and plastic packaging actually gets recycled, in practice. Worldwide, we (usually) pay no deposit fee, and so recycling is entirely optional. Here in Sweden, we have a very efficient system (we have two trash cans collected, one of them with separate sections for plastic and paper packaging). Sadly, it is often reported that the subsequent treatment of plastic packaging, for example, is not the best — indeed, it has been claimed that, even though 85% is recycled, much of this goes to China, where it is placed in landfill. Cardboard is apparently dealt with much better.

Bag in box

Most wine drinkers are familiar with this one, so I don’t need to say much. Way back in 1964, an Australian wine-maker (Thomas Angove) decided to adapt the way in which battery acid is transported, immediately recognizing its potential for wine drinking. The main subsequent trick was to put a tap on the bag (in 1967), rather than a clothes-peg. For our purposes here, it is basically a plastic bag inside a cardboard box, so its manufacture and disposal advantages are pretty much as discussed above.

One of the extra advantages of this packaging style is the size of the container. Larger containers have less packaging per unit of content, and these commonly contain 3–4 liters of wine, which exceeds that commonly used for the alternatives discussed above. So, they compare very well in terms of sustainability (Economic and environmental sustainability of wine packaging systems).

The main practical issue is that it has been adopted principally for inexpensive wines in large amounts. So, the task of getting premium wine drinkers to use it will be a major undertaking. Apparently, “only 37% of regular wine drinkers consider bag-in-box to be a sustainable form of wine packaging” (When in Rome is on a mission with alternative wine packaging).

Light-weight glass bottles

Having considered the above options, what if we decide to continue using glass bottles, at least for premium wines? After all, glass is considered to be good for long-term storage (a decade or two?), as well as for sparkling wines. Otherwise, a heavy glass bottle is simply a subjective image that some people associate with high quality contents.

Alko, the Finnish national alcohol retailer, has categorized wine bottles weighing less than 420 grams as “environmentally friendly packaging” — after all, a 330 g glass bottle will protect wine equally well as a bottle weighing several kilograms (Wine bottles: a heavy price). Recently, an industry collaboration in Australia released a lightweight Reverse Taper bottle weighing 420 grams, which is 195 g less than the standard Reverse Taper bottle, and this equates to an 18% reduction in emissions (Premium wine packaging gets a sustainable makeover).

Things are somewhat different for sparkling wines, since there is internal gas pressure. Currently, the champagne house Telmont is testing the lightest champagne bottle, but this only takes the standard 835 grams down to 800 g. So, things do not look too sustainable in the sparkling wine world.

There is at least one U.S. vineyard that long ago converted its entire line of wines to lightweight glass bottles (Fetzer Vineyards converts to lightweight glass bottles). In the process, they expected to have “an average annual decrease of 16 percent in glass usage, a reduction of some 2,100 tons, and a 14 percent drop in greenhouse gas emissions, an estimated 3,000 tons of CO2”.

Different bottle shapes, etc

So, what if we focus on transportation rather than the manufacture? In that case, it is the shape of the bottle that can be improved, as well as its weight. Here, flat plastic bottles are an example of the new wine packaging that is being launched globally; and watertight wood-fibre packaging has also been developed in Finland (New winds in wine packaging: lightweight and environmentally friendly). I am not so sure about the latter; but a container that fits in your hip pocket has long been seen as a good thing by certain alcohol consumers.

This issue combines of course, with wine tourism, as Robert Joseph has pointed out (Heavy bottles and wine tourism - and their carbon footprint). Tourism generates a lot of CO2, and so the products sold to them should be as environmentally friendly as possible. **

Furthermore, transporting bulk wine is more sustainable than bottled wine, since it does not involve the retail package at all; and it is continually increasing (Global trade of bulk wine reached historical levels in 2021). All that has to happen is for consumers to learn to associate the bulk stuff with high quality (Drinks trade must change its attitude to bulk wine) — apparently, premium bulk is gaining in share (Bulk rides high as global trade in wine grows).

Conclusion

There are thus lots of options for the wine industry to move forward, into a more sustainable future. Many of these are discussed further in the International Wineries for Climate Action (IWCA) 2nd Annual Report. However, it has been noted that corporations might well embrace sustainability (in theory) but still struggle to act (in practice). Nevertheless, the wine industry is much better placed for a sustainable future than things like cryptocurrencies, for example (New York governor signs first-of-its-kind law cracking down on Bitcoin mining)!

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* Thanks to Alan Goldfarb for alerting me to this.

** According to Wine Australia, less than half of all people who visit wineries are motivated to taste and buy wines. So: Think of visitors as ‘wine tourists’ — not wine consumers.

Wine packaging is going to change, sooner rather than later

Occasionally (ie once a month), some pundit starts to pontificate about the future of the wine industry, using some sort of crystal ball. They opine on different wine styles (eg natural wines) and upcoming regions (or old countries re-born), or consider the increasing importance of wine coolers and other mixed drinks (RTD). They also worry about inflation, rising competition from cannabis farming, and continual government investigations of distributors and retailers.

However, we do not need a crystal ball to realize that one thing for sure in the future is going to involve reducing the so-called “carbon footprint” of producing and selling wine. The world has finally gotten the message, after at least a century (You were first warned about global warming 110 years ago), that we are rapidly creating a world that we cannot easily live in. The blanket of carbon and nitrogen compounds that currently surrounds our planet has got to be reduced, and sooner rather than later. * Otherwise, Climate Change will simply increase in effect, with extreme weather events becoming ever more frequent and harmful (eg. floods in some places and droughts in others). **

So, there is now a lot being written about the word "sustainability", although it has been noted that “the term is often misused and rarely completely understood” (What does sustainability in wine actually mean?). There are, however, formal initiatives such as Sustainable Winegrowing Australia, which try to develop usefully sustainable systems. (NB: there are several others of these, as well.)

The SWA has released their 2021 Impact Report, which describes one general approach. Sadly, while it does talk about reducing “excess packaging”, it fails to mention that packaging is itself the biggest issue of all. To this end, it was recently noted (The new old wine bottle technology):

It has been broadly accepted that biggest contribution to a wine’s carbon footprint comes, not from vineyard or cellar practices, but from the energy deployed during the manufacturing and transportation of the glass bottle itself, from factory to end-drinker. Conservative estimates say that glass bottles account for about 29 percent of a wine's carbon pollution, but other estimates posit that the bottle is responsible for up to 70 percent of a wine’s impact.

So, there seems to be no doubt that wine packaging, in general, is going to change, from now on. The fancy stuff may still be packaged in the old way, by the high-status producers; but the stuff that the rest of us drink will either be in reusable bottles or not in bottles at all. For example:

Across the world, a movement toward reusing wine bottles is gathering force. In some ways, it seems strange that it has taken so long. But in reality, it hasn't — we just abandoned the practice when technology, convenience and abundant supply allowed us to.

Even British wine professionals (>50 of them) have gotten the message (Leading wine professionals sign letter calling for alternative packaging), that:

switching from glass to alternative formats could save ‘well over a third of the carbon footprint of wine consumed in the UK’ – the equivalent of taking 350,000 cars off the road overnight. Alternative formats, such as boxed wine, canned wine, kegs, paper bottles and pouches, all have much a smaller carbon footprint than glass.

However, we have known all of this for at least a decade. That is, the information needed for us to be proactive has already been available to us. Nevertheless, only recently does it seem to have become important for producer actions to be proposed. That is (Thirst for sustainability permeates the wine industry):

Vineyards and wineries are increasingly considering how to adopt more sustainable practices in every aspect of how they farm, the products they create, and the services and methods they utilize. The list of factors that can be altered to allow for increased sustainability range from vineyard farming practices to the winery workings, to the distribution of the final packaged goods.

Perhaps the most comprehensive presentation of the available packaging options, and their environmental “costs”, appeared a dozen years ago (August 2010):

Nordic Life Cycle Assessment Wine Package Study

This was prepared on behalf of Systembolaget and Vinmonopolet, the two national alcohol retailers for Sweden and Norway, respectively. This is one of the advantages of having national retailers (see also Wine monopolies, and the availability of wine), that co-ordinated action can be taken (unlike, for example, in the U.S.A., with its fragmented market and notoriously problematic three-tier system).

The report is nothing if not both comprehensive and detailed. There are 180 pages of data tables and graphs, along with oodles of text. The bottom line about packaging is very simple, though:

The comparative analysis has been performed on five indicators: global warming potential, air acidification, abiotic depletion, primary energy, and water consumption ... Most of the environmental impacts of a packaging system are related to the following aspects: primary and secondary packaging, distribution, and end-of-life [waste management] ... Most of the environmental impacts are related to the production of the raw materials used in the packaging systems. The most important contributor is primary packaging, [and] glass seems to be the most impacting system for all the indicators studied in the comparative analysis.

Given that this report emanated from Scandinavia, it should come as no surprise that it is the Nordic retailers who are leading the way forward (Can the Nordic monopolies turn the drinks world green?). *** There are five national alcohol retailers involved:

Sweden’s Systembolaget, Finland’s Alko, Norway’s Vinmonopolet, Iceland’s Vínbúðin and the Faroe Islands’ Rúsdrekkasøla Landsins have collectively announced a plan to become beverage business leaders in sustainable development. The specific target is for 2030 CO2 emissions to be half their 2019 levels. This will involve actions at every stage of the production, packaging and distribution processes, and will involve consumers as well as industry professionals.

That is, these retailers are putting their money where their mouths are. What about everyone else in the wine industry? It is easy in northern Europe to take collective action, but the rest of the world may not find it quite so straightforward, without official government mandates. From now on, though, so-called “alternative packaging” (eg. What is the future of alternative wine packaging?) will no longer be just theoretical alternatives.

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* Excess nitrogen in wastewater is just as bad, from both human urine and faeces. For example: Eating too much protein makes pee a problem pollutant in the U.S.

** The Russian government seems to be the only one currently claiming that Climate Change will be of benefit to them; but in practice this seems to be an unlikely outcome (A hotter Russia). By the way, did you know that: Climate change is making it more expensive to insure art?

*** Nordic = Scandinavia (Denmark, Iceland, Norway, Sweden) + Finland.

Can you tell the difference between Australia and New Zealand (wine)?

Last week, I made a few observations about the relative behavior of Australians and New Zealanders, with respect to alcohol consumption. For example, the New Zealanders were reported to drink more often, but the Australians were more likely to get drunk, and then regret this outcome.

This comparison is relevant, because, in general, there is actually not all that much cultural difference between the two countries, at least compared to other English-speaking countries, such as Canada, South Africa, and the United Kingdom, plus the United States of America. However, in the wine world there are considerable differences, which I will look at here.

As an aside, back at the beginning of the last century, when Australia was being federated, to shake off the unwanted British yoke (officially, January 1 1901), the New Zealanders were offered the golden opportunity to become a state of Australia. They declined. This was unforgivable; and it has not yet been forgiven, even after a century. There is nothing better for Australians than beating the New Zealanders at any given sporting event, for example.

Therefore, it really rankles when we expat Australians read a report like this:

Little known. Since 2016, the U.S. has imported more wine from New Zealand than from Australia (by value) --  and the gap has been growing. In 2021, imports from NZL were 88% higher than those from AUS.

This is illustrated in the following graph (from the AAWE). New Zealand wine exports to the USA have been continually on the increase in value since 1992, while the Australian export values peaked in 2007, and have continually decreased since then. The point of equal US import value was in 2016.

This raises several questions. First: What is wrong with those Americans? After all, they are clearly wrong! Can’t they tell New Zealand wine from Australian wine? Surely not!! *

A second question relates to wine volume, as opposed to value. After all, the NZ increase may simply be that they are charging more for their wines. I will not go into this one here, but will, instead, look at another question: some declining Australian export values to other countries.

The obvious country, in this regard, is China. It has been noted that:

Australia exports wine to over 100 markets, but in 2020 the top 5 markets (Canada, China, Hong Kong, United Kingdom and United States) accounted for 75% of total wine export volume and 77% of export revenue. China was the largest in value terms, accounting for 33% of export revenue and ranking third in volume (after United Kingdom and United States) at 13%.

Well, all of that changed. This next graph shows the value of Australian wine exports to China plus the rest of the world, since 2002 (from Winetitles Media). Note that it indicates that Australian wine export value peaked at the end of 2007 (just as we saw for the USA, above), then declined until mid 2013, increasing again thereafter. It also shows that the largest component of the latter increase was exports specifically to China — so, that is where Australian wine went after the post-2007 declines.

The China exports peaked in 2020 and then (quite literally) crashed in 2021. Part of this decline has been a general decrease in wine consumption in China. This is illustrated by the AAWE graph showing that “from its peak in 2017, China’s wine consumption has decreased by more than 45%”. That is a pretty serious reduction.

However, the main reason for the vinous disaster has been the Chinese claim that the Australians had been dumping wine in China — ie. insisting that in order to receive this particular wine then the Chinese importer also had to buy this other wine as well (whether they wanted to or not). This has lead the Chinese to impose import tariffs of more than 200% on all Australian wine, in retaliation. **

Hence the crash, when combined with declining consumption. However, even in 2021 Australia still managed to be 5th in the value of wine imports in China, although 7th in volume (China’s wine imports 2021), after falling from a clear 1st place (see the table below).

It is therefore sad to note that: New Zealand wine export value hits all-time high. [Expletive deleted.]

A final question is: What are Australians doing about this? It has been noted that: Australia’s wine stock levels rise following 12 months of challenging global conditions; as loss of sales has not been compensated by reduced production. Indeed, the current vintage definitely has problems (Vintage 2023 not business as usual), concerning:

how winegrape growers can prepare for changes to their income when faced with oversupply issues, increases in shipping and freight costs, the ongoing impact of China’s wine trade tariff, and market values dropping, particularly with Shiraz and Cabernet sauvignon varieties.

Which winemaker would you rather be, just at the moment: an Australian or a New Zealander?

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*  In case Californians are wondering where their water has gone in the past few years, they should check out the reports of unusual floods that have occurred in south-eastern Australia during exactly that same period of time; and then think about the clockwise flows of air around the edge of the northern Pacific Ocean. A drought does not mean that the water has disappeared, but instead that it has gone somewhere else.

**  The alleged dumping was merely a point of political discussion, until an idiotic Australian politician suggested (in public) that China should be officially investigated about the origin of the current SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Almost immediately, the tariffs were announced by an offended Chinese government. Indeed, no-one had suggested that the USA should be investigated about the origin of the H1N1 influenza pandemic of 2009, nor the so-called Spanish Flu of 1918 (the biggest pandemic on record); so why finger the Chinese this time? (Both flu viruses arose in Kansas,)

Alcohol usage (and over-usage) around the world

You may never have heard of it, but there is a survey called the Global Drug Survey, which has been conducted annually since 2012. This year's report should be released in another month, or so. However, the results have not differed much for the past couple of years, so a look at last year’s results could be informative. Clearly, alcohol is one of the drugs studied.

This is claimed to be the world’s largest drug survey, intended “to promote honest conversations about drug use, and help people use drugs more safely regardless of the legal status of the drug.” The interest is not in the levels of use, per se, but in a comparison of use patterns and trends.

Available online are the Global Drug Survey 2021 Key Findings Report, and an Executive Summary. Here, I will extract some of the information as related solely to alcohol. In 2021, there were 32,000 respondents, from 22 countries (each with >160 participants). About one-third of the respondents were from Germany, followed by New Zealand and the United States.

Let’s start with rates of drug use. Here are the percentages of the 32,000 people who had used each of the listed drugs during the previous year. Clearly, alcohol predominates; but cannabis and tobacco both get more than 50% usage. Compare this to my youth, when huge numbers of people smoked tobacco, but no-one admitted to smoking cannabis, except university students!

As far as alcohol is concerned, the majority of the respondents were categorized as low-risk drinkers (on the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test, developed by the World Health Organization). This does not mean that people do not like a drink, or two. This next graph shows the number of days on which alcohol was reported to be consumed within the previous 12 months, for several of the countries.

There is nothing too unexpected there. The French drink on average every 3 days, and the Hungarians every 4 days. However, the Germans are below the global average; and the New Zealanders drink notably more often than do the Australians.

There is also, of course, the matter of getting drunk — defined as “having drunk so much that your physical and mental faculties are impaired”. This next graph shows the number of occasions, within the previous 12 months, reported by members of several of the countries. The survey average was 9 times, which is about once every 40 days.

Moreover, those Australians in the survey managed about twice the global average rate, with the Danes and Finns not that far behind, along with the Americans. The Germans, Spaniards and Italians clearly drink in moderation, along with the New Zealanders. That is, Australians drink less often than New Zealanders, but when they did drink they were more likely to keep drinking.

After getting drunk, it is always possible to feel regret about this activity. This next graph shows the percentage of occasions on which the participants “wished you had drunk less or not drunk at all.” This generally seemed to vary between about one-fifth and one-quarter of the occasions.

The Danes and Finns seem to have the fewest regrets, in spite of leading the way in drinking, while the Australians regretted much more — maybe this is why they drink less often than New Zealanders — they drink less often but get drunk more often, and then regret it. The Irish and Poles had the most regrets.

There must, of course, be a reason for having regrets, and a number of reasons were provided, as listed in the next graph. Each person was asked “to think back over the occasions they have regretted getting drunk and select their top three reasons for why this happened.” The graph shows the percentage of people who selected each reason as first, second or third. The lesson here is not to drink your alcohol too fast, nor to mix your drinks.

Getting drunk is never recommended. After all: 1 in 5 deaths of US adults 20 to 49 is from excessive drinking; and even: In young adults, moderate to heavy drinking is linked to higher risk of stroke. Worse still, we have been told that the: Alcohol death toll is growing, due to the ongoing pandemic.

You can have a drink or two, but not five or six.