The University of California, Davis has opened doors to what is being called the world’s most green winery. The US$20 million research winery is designed to become self-sustainable in water and energy use once all its features are operational. The 34,000sq ft research complex that will act as a testing ground for new, eco-friendly production processes and techniques comprises of winery, a brewery and food processing facilities.
Located just adjacent to a new 12-acre research vineyard, the self-sufficiency model is part of the Robert Mondavi Institute for Wine and Food Science. It comes loaded with green features like solar power generation, rainwater conservation and harvesting. A large-capacity system captures rainwater and conserves it with a planned expanded system that is designed to reuse of 90% of captured rainwater.
Sporting the world’s first wireless fermentation system, which includes automated temperature and pump-over controls on its 152 fermentation tanks, along with sensors to measure sugar concentrations every 15 minutes and to a precision of 0.25 brix. In order to capture carbon dioxide emissions during the fermentation process, the winery uses a port in each of the fermentation tanks that removes the gas and eliminates the need to use energy to improve air quality and temperature control.
Via: Decanter