Off-grid, on track
When you're a winemaker who's just spent recent months working 12 or more hours a day, seven days a week, it can be hard to sum up how vintage turned out this year. Much of it passes as an unbroken sequence of grapes in, money out.
Pausing to reflect on World Environment Day – June 5 – Moores Hill Estate winemaker Julian Allport says vintage 2020 marked four years of making wine powered by the sun at his company's off-grid winery in the Tamar Valley.
"Job done," he muses.
"We've had no regrets when it comes to our commitment to solar energy. It's saved us around $15,000 a year in electricity costs. We're on track for the system to have paid for itself by the end of 2021."
Allport along with co-owners Fiona Weller and Tim and Sheena High represent a growing number of Australian wineries that are investing in renewable energy in order to reduce their operating costs and carbon footprints.
The Adelaide-trained winemaker says electricity consumption accounts for around 40 percent of all winery expenditure.
According to Australia's Climate Council, 2017 was watershed year for renewable energy, with more capacity being added globally than in any other year.
"Coincidentally, it was the year we began our off-grid project," Allport explains.
"We didn't set out to build a solar-powered winery. We just wanted to build a big shed where we could do small batch winemaking and take better control of our production. Our focus was on improving wine quality and reducing the costs of doing business. But the quote we received for a contractor to dig through our 7ha vineyard and connect the planned winery to a power pole down the road turned out to be eye-watering.
"We looked at our numbers and then talked with other winemakers about how much power they used. We reckoned solar energy set-up costs would require 20 percent more financial investment than conventional three-phase power. But without ongoing power bills, we figured the payback period would be only five years. Decision made."
The owners then contacted locally-based architect and design professional Joel Fletcher. His Simplicity Studio was given the brief to provide detailed plans for a functional, no-frills 100-tonne capacity winery to be erected on the Sidmouth site. d2 Spaces and Mode Electrical were commissioned to build the facility and install its 30kW array of solar panels and 100kWh of battery storage.
To enhance the winery's sustainability credentials, additional design features allow rain water to be collected from the roof and used throughout the building. A closed loop system treats subsequent waste water that is then settled and dispersed into nearby bushland.
Construction marked some significant company milestones. For Allport and Weller, it provided opportunity to celebrate the 20th anniversary of their vineyard being planted. For Tim and Sheena High of Native Point Wines, it marked the start of an exciting new business partnership with the Moores Hill couple.
The winery's cutting-edge design and inherent sustainability met with a raft of local and national awards. In September 2017, the Australian Society of Viticulture and Oenology (ASVO) named Allport one of four finalists in its prestigious national award for ASVO Winemaker of the Year. The following month, the facility won the 'Innovative Process' award at the 2017 Innovative Tasmania Awards.
A ground-breaking project for the Tasmanian wine industry at large, the winery is not without shortcomings, Allport concedes.
"The only real drawback is that the winery isn't connected to the electricity grid owned by TasNetworks," he says.
"We can't export excess power back to the State grid. But we can send it to our cellar door and that allows us to offset our electricity costs there. If we were to make any further investments, doubling our storage battery capacity would provide added flexibility."
Allport believes Australians in general are frustrated that renewable energy isn't being used more widely around the country.
"In terms of harvesting energy from the sun, crikey, if you can do it in northern Tasmania, you can do it just about anywhere," he says.
"Sure, there are some days when we might need to schedule our heating and/or cooling operations to suit the weather, but it's no different in the vineyard. If we need to go outside and prune and the forecast is for four or five days of wet weather, we just won't prune. We'll devote that week to something else. As sure as night follows day, you know it's not going to be long before you see more favourable weather again. We don't need many hours of sunlight to fully charge our batteries.
"Choosing to make wine sustainably isn't a matter of political ideology for us. It just makes sense. If a small business like ours can benefit from it, just imagine what could happen on a larger scale."
First published 5 June 2020: tasmaniantimes.com