Water use in wineries: conservation and best practices to reduce, recycle, and reuse

Abstract

Our countries encourage water conservation measures to ensure availability across all territories during periods of strain. The wine industry must anticipate periods of high demand, such as harvest time, to contribute to this management. Water savings in the winery are primarily concentrated in hygiene operations (which account for 80 % of the water used in the cellar), at three levels. Optimizing equipment (foam cannons, medium pressure washers, rotary jets) and rinsing phases (an indicator of pollution levels) constitutes the first level of measures to encourage. The parameters of the hygiene procedure must be optimized according to the site’s resources (heat, pressure, etc.) to limit the quantities of water and cellar effluents that will need to be treated downstream. Recycling certain fractions of final rinse water for intermediate rinses or other pre-washing at production sites is a source of drinking water savings that can represent significant volumes (rinsing bottles during packaging) without necessarily requiring upstream treatment. Regulations have opened the door to the use of non-conventional water sources in wineries. This is the third potential source of drinking water savings being implemented today, and it involves larger volumes. Thus, winery effluents (process water) can, with appropriate treatment, be reused for hygiene operations in the winery. The objective is to define residual pollution thresholds for specific uses. Sanitary considerations are essential in this approach to ensure the successful reuse of effluents. The various uses for this treated wastewater are therefore considerably expanded (irrigation, equipment cleaning, hygiene of surfaces in contact with wine).

References

1. Poupault, P. Water Use in Wineries: Conservation and Best Practices to Reduce, Recycle and Reuse. Recording of the presentation delivered at Enoforum Spain 2026, Zaragoza, 20–21 May 2026. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtMjNdjbehQ