Consumers don’t have access to much information about how businesses operate, but they can ask questions and focus on one tangible item, the bottle. The exquisite vulnerability of grapes to nuances of weather makes wine both particularly susceptible to climate change and a harbinger of what’s to come for many other agricultural products.

1. HOW DOES YOUR LOVE OF WINE
CONTRIBUTE TO CLIMATE CHANGE?
Consumers don’t have access to much information about how businesses
operate, but they can ask questions and focus on one tangible item, the bottle.
The exquisite vulnerability of grapes to nuances of weather makes wine both
particularly susceptible to climate change and a harbinger of what’s to come
for many other agricultural products.
Do wine consumers have a role in encouraging producers to take stronger
steps to combat climate change? Some in the wine industry think they do,
particularly by throwing their economic support to companies that are already
acting decisively.
“The consumer is the key to this,” Adrian Bridge, the chief executive of Taylor
Fladgate, the historic port producer, wrote in an email. “Changing our own
behavior matters, and asking others to change theirs as well. This does mean
buying from companies that are doing a good job and avoiding companies
that are not.”

2. It’s equally important for consumers to make clear to the wine industry that
fighting climate change is an urgent issue. Both through their buying decisions
and through old-fashioned advocacy — which might include letters and emails
to producers, importers and wine publications, as well as direct conversations
with wine merchants and restaurateurs — consumers must demand that the
wine industry take action.
That industry is simply a microcosm of larger society. Just as politicians have
little incentive to address climate change unless voters require it, many wine
producers are less inclined to reduce their own carbon footprints unless
consumers demonstrate that such steps are important to them.
Some producers are already actively engaged in the fight, whether by
changing their agricultural practices, reducing their carbon footprints or
carefully limiting their use of water. Others, whether out of a sense of fatalism
or greed, have chosen either to wait it out or do nothing, seeing only the
expense without the benefits.
But how can anybody distinguish the environmental heroes from the
do-nothings? That requires consumers to educate themselves in ways that
are not easy, particularly because reliable information is difficult to come by.
Many in the wine industry are notoriously opaque about their agriculture, their
cellar techniques and their ingredients.
“Consumers are most powerful, in my view, in their role as buyers of products,
so they can have an impact if they are able to distinguish between products
that are climate-friendly and those that are not,” said Mike Veseth, a retired
economics professor who writes the blog The Wine Economist. “The problem
is that, unless they do a lot of research, consumers don’t really know the

3. carbon footprint of the wines they purchase and so cannot steer their dollars
to those who do best.”
Even knowing the agricultural and cellar practices of a winemaker will not give
the full picture.
There are many reasons to prefer producers who work organically or
biodynamically in the vineyard. These techniques may be healthier for
vineyard workers, for the soil and for the environment in some ways, and they
may yield better wine. But adopting these techniques still leaves plenty of
wiggle room for dealing — or not dealing — with climate change.
Do producers plow or till the rows between the vines, which releases carbon
to the atmosphere? Or do they plant and maintain a cover crop, whether
grasses, legumes or something else? An organic or biodynamic grower could
do either. But maintaining a cover crop creates a lower carbon footprint.
Do they mow the cover crop? Or simply roll it? Rolling it releases less carbon
from the soil.
Using organic compost is good for vineyards. But do producers make it
themselves? Or do they buy it and ship it, possibly from a distance?
Do they use electric or hybrid vehicles? Or standard combustion engines?
Are they practicing regenerative agriculture by minimizing use of chemical
sprays and acting to promote biodiversity and soil life?
Have they converted to renewable fuels? Do they practice carbon
sequestration, in which carbon is captured and stored rather than released
into the atmosphere?
Where does their electricity come from? How do they manage their use of
water?

4. These are the many questions that consumers would need to address in
judging a producer’s carbon output, and the answers are not easy to find.
Finally, skilled farmers are empathetic and intuitive, sensing what is needed to
maintain and encourage a healthy ecosystem. It’s hard for consumers to
determine how well vineyards and their carbon footprints are managed. An
official certification for organic or biodynamic practices bears little relation to a
farmer’s skill or carbon management.
“I don’t believe that there really exists a certifying tool that clearly identifies
‘success’ in carbon sequestration or environmental virtue,” said Randall
Grahm, proprietor of Bonny Doon Vineyard in California. “Rather like
organized religion, outward piety seems to count for more than internal grace.”
Mr. Bridge, the port producer, has particularly felt the urgency of the climate
situation. Aside from reducing the carbon footprint and water consumption at
Taylor Fladgate, conserving energy and increasing the biodiversity of its
vineyards, Mr. Bridge founded the Porto Protocol, an initiative that aims to
inspire companies and individuals to do more to fight climate change.
The organization has held global conferences the last two years in Porto,
Portugal, bringing politicians, scientists and wine companies together to
discuss climate change and possible solutions.
Right now the Porto Protocol website primarily serves as a clearinghouse of
information, offering case studies of companies that have taken steps to
confront their own carbon footprints as well as the presentations that were
offered at the summits.
At this year’s conference, Roger Boulton, a viticulture and enology professor
at the University of California at Davis, urged wine companies to build
completely sustainable, zero-carbon facilities from now on. He offered

5. practical methods for achieving the goal, like using solar and wind to stay off
the energy grid, and solutions for minimizing water use, particularly important
as drought conditions afflict many parts of the wine-producing world.
“Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it,”
Mr. Boulton said, quoting Gandhi.
That applies particularly to consumers, who may feel overwhelmed both by
the scale of the problem and the difficulty of getting pertinent information.
Little things do add up. Let’s start with the most tangible item in wine, the
glass bottle.
Over the last 20 years, wine marketers have come to believe that the public
associates thick, heavy wine bottles with higher-quality wines. The heavier the
bottles, the more people would be willing to pay for them: This equation
seems to be accepted in marketing departments worldwide, wherever
aspirations evolve into pretensions.
The association of a heavy bottle with quality is absurd, of course, just as not
so long ago many people believed that deeper-colored, darker-red wines were
invariably better and worth a higher price.
In fact, the environmental cost of heavy bottles, from their production to the
carbon cost of shipping them, is high. This is something wineries have the
power to address. Consumers can judge for themselves.
A study by the California Sustainable Winegrowing Alliance, a nonprofit
industry group, calculated that packaging, particularly the weight of glass
bottles, was one of four key areas in which wineries could do the most to cut
their carbon footprint, along with vineyard chemical use, energy use in the
vineyard and winery, and transportation of packaged wine.

6. Some bottles are by necessity heavier than others, like those used for
Champagne, which requires stronger glass because the contents are under
high pressure. But most wines don’t need the heavy bottles.
So what can consumers do? Choose the wines in lighter bottles, and complain
to producers, importers, distributors and merchants about the heavier ones.
How else can you choose better packaging? Patronize bars and restaurants
that serve wines-by-the-glass from kegs, which not only can be cleaned and
reused but also do a better job of keeping wine fresh than half-empty bottles.
Boxed wines are lighter to ship and keep better, too. I would love to see wine
producers step up to put better-quality wines in those boxes.
All these measures barely scratch the surface, unfortunately. To really make
informed choices, consumers need to know what wineries are doing in the
vineyard. It would be great if the Porto Protocol, for example, would publish a
checklist of questions that consumers could ask wine producers to help
determine accurately what they are doing about climate change. And yes,
they are questions that wine writers need to ask, too.
As Gandhi suggested, no step is too small. The least we can do is make
climate issues more urgent in our own lives, and to pass that message on to
others.
“Things change,” Mr. Bridge said, “when society demands it.”