Make Your Wine Greener

Gretchen Neuman
VinoVerve Editor

Today is Earth Day. The one day of the year when we are supposed to contemplate the way we treat our home, the Earth.

In the past, I worked in the environmental field. I have seen stupid people touch materials they didn’t understand and create a disaster. It was sometimes demoralizing work. Dealing with huge corporations that knew how environmental agencies worked and just waited them out. Knowing that the bigger the litigation that they created, the higher the likelihood that they would get out of paying their fair share of the clean up. I saw business leaders complaining about environmental rules, complaining that having to clean up the toxic messes that they made would bankrupt them. I never saw many companies that were ultimately bankrupted and closed down because of their messes, at least not the big companies that complained the loudest about the regulations. But at least I knew that I was making a difference. .

While we have regressed somewhat on the rules that existed about clean air or water or toxic emissions, I am sure that they will be restored. We are opening a new chapter in the environmental protection. This time we are looking at green house gases and the impact that they have on our planet’s climate.

And like in the past, we are hearing the same arguments about the cost of potential regulations. And, as in the past, these arguments are equally ridiculous. The reason why is simple. In fact, it is basic economics. Opportunity cost. You look at the costs related to the inputs and you look at the cost of all the outputs. Damage to the environment as an input has only started to be calculated in the last 50 years. But that doesn’t mean that it is without value. What we are doing now, is re-evaluating the way we calculate our opportunity costs. This is good. It is looking at the bigger picture, adding more information about the true costs of everything we do.

Now, what does this have to do with wine?

Well, I was reading Dr. Vino’s piece from April, 14th, yesterday about the carbon footprint of wine. He was showing the CO2 equivalents (or CO2E) released into the atmosphere as the result of shipping wine from Australia, France, Napa Valley and Chile to Los Angeles, New York City and Chicago. The impact of sea shipping on the environment is less than that of trucks so naturally, imported wines have much less impact on the environments for Los Angeles and New York which are major seaports. Ironically, the highest environmental impact comes from Napa Valley wines which are trucked everywhere they go in the U.S. and everything coming into Chicago is trucked at some point making the impact of our wine drinking among the highest.

Living in the Chicago, you almost have to wonder if it is possible to make your wine green.

And the simple answer is yes.

Become a locavore or at least more of one.

A locavore is a person who makes a vow to try to eat foods that come from a distance of 100 miles or less. In the Midwest this can be tricky, but not impossible. In fact, by my estimate there are at least 32 wineries within 100 miles of Chicago. And a quarter of that 100 mile radius is in Lake Michigan!

So if you are thinking that living in Chicago, or Memphis, or Milwaukee or any other “flyover” states, as we are often referred to by Washington pundits and you think that you can’t make green choices with regards to wine? Don’t. There is wine all around you. Your state produces wine. You can cut your greenhouse gas footprint and still drink wine. Just go out and explore your local wines. Feel limited about your choices? Expand your radius by another 100 miles. You will still be making an impact.

I would like to think that is what we at VinoVerve can help you do. Marguerite has been drinking wine from New York, Connecticut and even New Jersey. Kevin and I have been trying wines from Missouri, Tennessee, Illinois, Michigan and Ohio. We are helping you explore the wines all around us, both from far but especially from near.

So this year, for year for Earth Day, do your part for the environment and drink local!

Tags: Earth Day, locavore

This entry was posted on April 22, 2009 at 12:01 am and is filed under Environment, Gretchen Neuman, local wines. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.