Fetzer Winery: Hopland, Mendocino County
The Fetzer family and Paul Dolan, who would become Fetzer's president, adopted sustainable business practices as early as the mid-1980s. By 1998, Fetzer had firmly established a triple bottom line: economic vitality, environmental responsibility, and social equity. More recently, Fetzer announced that by 2010 it would only purchase organic grapes (Fetzer's own acreage is already organic).
Energy conservation is a main focus for Fetzer Winery. Fetzer has implemented an energy-reduction program throughout its 10,000-square foot administrative building, 130,000 square feet of barrel storage, 140,000-square foot bottling warehouse, and a tank farm
- Fetzer installed a 40-kilowatt photovoltaic system that powers 75% of the administration building’s electric needs, and feeds any excess power back to the utility grid (net metering)
- Over a 25-year lifetime, the photovoltaic system will reduce an estimated 850 lbs. of nitrogen oxide and 1088 tons of carbon dioxide – the equivalent effect of planting 375 acres of trees or eliminating 4 million miles of drive time
- Fetzer contracted for 100% green (renewable) energy in order to produce 3 million bottles of wine annually
- Fetzer’s administration building is a rammed-earth structure and was fully powered by the photovoltaic system in 2002
- Fetzer is the largest grower of certified organically grown grapes, farmed without the use of pesticides, herbicides or chemical fertilizers
- Fetzer installed a high-efficiency heat exchanger, saving 700-million Btus per year and $1,500 on reduced boiler maintenance, with labor savings of $48,000, water savings and reduced waste, and total savings of $76,500; simple payback for this investment is under one year
- The facility saved roughly 1 million kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity
- The building employs passive solar design and rammed-earth construction to minimize the need for mechanical systems while taking advantage of free daylighting and natural ventilation
- Electricians pre-wired the building for a photovoltaic system that would be later installed
- A simple insulated concrete wall, for example, was constructed to separate cold stabilizing wine from warm-fermenting wine, reducing energy bills by $5,000 per month
- The winery reduced landfill waste by 94%, since 1990, through a comprehensive recycling program targeting bottles, cardboard, plastic, aluminum, paper, antifreeze, waste oil, fluorescent tubes and glass
- On-site wastewater is managed through a natural filtration system with gravel and sand filters and a planted reed bed, which reduces water consumption by 24%, or 6.6 million gallons, and consumption to only 2.1 gallons for every gallon of wine
- All wine bottles are made from 40% recycled glass (post-consumer)
- Case boxes are made from 100% post-consumer waste
- Fetzer partnered with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories (LBNL) to develop the computer-based Benchmarking and Energy and water Savings Tool (BEST), which helps more than 1,000 wineries in California better understand and manage resource use
Fetzer has 1200 horsepower (hp) of compressor motors available for cooling white wine, which is stored in tanks. To make these run more efficiently, Fetzer installed programmable logic controls (PLC) that monitor the refrigerant for temperature and pressure. The controls use this data to cycle compressors on/off as needed, decreasing runtime of both the compressors and chilling tower pumps. Since runtimes are reduced, maintenance needs are also lowered and the useful lifespan of the compressors is increased.
The PLC resulted in annual energy savings of over 225,000 kWh, with cost savings of nearly $30,000. Maintenance costs were reduced, too, by about $4,000 per year. PG&E provided a $28,000 rebate for this project, helping to make payback on Fetzer's investment in just over three years.
Company website: http://www.fetzer.com
Excerpted from Northern California Resource Directory
http://www.smallfirmsgreatprojects.org/project.php?pid=213
http://www.buildingconcerns.com/nocal/casecomm.htm
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