6. CO2 reduction

In 2018 we engaged Ernst & Young to measure our carbon footprint across Scopes 1, 2 and 3 of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol published by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development. We took this voluntary measure in order to guide our efforts at reducing the CO2 emissions arising from our activity. This means we are including emissions resulting from the production and transportation of the materials we buy and the transportation of our wines to our clients. We will shortly be sharing more details on our CO2 footprint and future reduction targets.

In 2016 we installed 1.500m2 of solar panels on the roof of one of our main bottling facilities in Vila Nova de Gaia. At its peak, this installation provides 35% of the building’s electricity needs, saving 10.5 tonnes in CO2 emissions. We have installed solar panels to supply the energy needs of the houses on various of our Douro properties. We are currently studying further installation of solar energy generation capacity to meet the power requirements of various other installations and wineries.

We run an ongoing continuous improvement project aimed at reducing the amount of energy used in our winery and bottling operations, per case of wine produced. We use an energy consumption management software which covers 75% of our contracted power. LED lighting is now standard and compressed air leaks are closely monitored. These measures have led to an electricity consumption reduction of 12% and 11% between 2016 and 2017 in our two bottling plants. We are aiming to reduce our energy consumption ratios and will shortly be announcing further targets.

In recent years we have made substantial strides to optimise the way wine is conveyed between vats, both in our Douro wineries and in our lodges in Vila Nova de Gaia. 70% of wine transfers in the latter are now achieved by way of gravity, rather than with the use of an electric pump. With careful planning we can continue increasing the volumes of wines we can move in this way. The mountainous Douro terrain and the steep slopes on which our Gaia lodges are built allow us to use the topography to our advantage.

Our largest wineries at Quinta do Sol and Quinta do Bomfim use a number of autovinifiers in the fermentation of young ports. This system is self-propelled, using the naturally occurring CO2 to pump the juice over the skins, as such the process does not require any additional or external power, representing considerable energy savings.

Our company has a range of offices and installations in the Douro Valley and in Porto, as well as our new quinta in the Alentejo. Wherever possible we encourage our employees to share cars for journeys between sites.

We are committed to moving our vehicle fleet away from diesel and petrol as soon as it is viable for us. Currently, the range of most electric cars is too limited for our requirements to travel between Porto and our properties in the Douro and Alentejo and there is not yet a charging infrastructure in place in these areas. However, we are conducting a viability study into this transition and are looking forward to a zero emissions reality for our company vehicles in the near future.

70% of the forklift trucks we use in our bottling facilities and wine cellars are electric. The others are powered by natural gas, which has lower levels of emissions than petrol/diesel. Over the coming years we intend to replace the natural gas vehicles, having a fully electric fleet of forklift trucks.