Use of water recourses

I was complaining recently ( well "moaning") about the high standing charges by my water/drainage supplier, to one of my sons --- as a very small user of water since I live on my own and so on and so on..

He said to me "Hey Dad how much water do you use in your wine making efforts!" And I did a simple sort of estimate and realised that my throughput of water was possibly very high/

We, living in parts of the world where water is still generally an abundant supply ( "on tap") tend to use it as a throw away material. I am sure that some little African girl/boy/woman/man, who has to carry it a long way is much more aware of its value. I grew older in the belief that fresh, cool, drinkable water was instantly available from the tap ( faucet). If it wasn't cold then just run it off, for a few gallons ( Imp or US) until it was nice.

Anyway I have been aware for some tine about the amount of water that I use. It is mainly in washing and cleaning. It actually mounts up to a frightening volume! And that is just as a "hobbyist"!

So lets look at it:-

Cleaning a freshly emptied 25 litre ( say five gals imp) fermenter.

  1. 10 gals minimum of cold water-- probably 15 just to remove the debris.
15 gals
  1. filled with hot near boiling water + detergent to clean.
5 gals. 3.1 day later , emptied and rinsed twice with cold water. Leave empty 10 gals
  1. Preparation for reuse. Fill with fresh water and empty.
5 gals
  1. Sanitize with solution of Pot meta. then rinse with a gal of water
1 gal

That's 36 gallons of water purely on fermenters and does not account for water spent in washing and sanitizing utensils. Another 2 gallons to take care of diluting the must and all the other things means that it must take over 40 gals imp+ ) to produce 5 gals (Imp) of wine. I bet that the really wastage of fresh water per 5 gallons of wine is nearer

50 or 60 gallons. Which is an awful lot! I wonder what the throughput of fresh water of a modern commercial vintner amounts to?
Reply to
pinky
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Oh, it's enormous and it's something the industry has been aware of a potential resource problem for quite some time now.

But wineries are making strides towards increased reuse/recycle. For example, in some of the drier areas of Australia and California some wineries are already using water recycling systems.

Ben

Reply to
benrotter

Yes, I have lived in places where water had to be carried rather than drawn from a tap. People tended to die young of all sorts of diseases that we do not have. They could not make wine to drink to protect themselves.

Ray

Reply to
Ray Calvert

Hmm, a gallon or two of water per vine per week for about six months (California, don't know about Texas). About a gallon of wine per vine so another 50 gallons of water per gallon of wine. If you're making five gallons per batch then add another 250 gallons.

Chris

Reply to
Chris

Hum, let's see: last time I tried to empty a bucket of dirty water in my backyard, the bucket was full again when I entered my basement. Nature recycles water in Holland in a frightening way. Although "South-Yorkshire" sounds pretty sunny and warm, I know that it is pretty much tipically English wheater there: it is foggy or raining, or it just has been and will be again very, very soon. Apart from that, yes we do use a lot of water, but if we didn't, we couldn't afford to use water even for a cup of tea. You know how it works: the government doesn't want us to use much water. Think of the dwindling resources, young man! The watercompany needs a certain amount of money every year, and indeed every year they need more; and if we don't use much water, the price will go up and up and up. Untill after a few years, water will cost you a dollar a drop. By the way: the fire department here has developed something they call Wunderful And Total Extinguishing Resource (WATER) that they are planning to use to fight fires, but they hesitate; it seems that this stuff can be found in wine, too. And too much wine can be harmful.........

Ed

"pinky" schreef in bericht news:gC6be.19249$ snipped-for-privacy@text.news.blueyonder.co.uk...

Reply to
de sik

Wow. That's a lot more water than I use to clean and I suspect most commercial wineries don't use that much (relative to the size of the fermenter) either.

I use maybe a gallon to remove debris and clean (maybe two if I need to use oxyclean).

Another gallon or maybe two to rinse ( I rinse more if I use oxyclean)

Store with some sulfite solution.

Drain the sulfite solution and use. No rinse, but that does mean that I'm probably adding a small, unmeasured amount of SO2 to the wine.

I think commercial wineries tend to use very hot water and or steam. I doubt they fill up a 1000 gallon stainless fermenters multiple times to clean and rinse. I'm sure they just use enough water to wash the surfaces.

Andy

Reply to
JEP62

JEP62 wrote: 'm probably adding a small, unmeasured amount of SO2 to the wine.

High pressure and high temperture cleans stainless steel very fast and with low amounts of water. If you're santizing the tanks you can daisy chain the sanitizer through the tanks much like the homebrewers do with corny kegs.

Reply to
JF

The voices in the head of "Ray Calvert" caused Ray Calvert to write in news:4S7be.274$ snipped-for-privacy@newssvr11.news.prodigy.com:

And this, quite possibly, explains why society has some of its alcohol problems today ...

Probably the biggest boon to mankind has been a guaranteed supply of clean water. In times gone by, those who drank (unclean - unboiled) water died. Those who drank wine or beer survived because the processes involved likely eliminated a lot of pathogens. Consequently, a gene for alcohol metabolism would have been expressed and quickly permeated the pool. Though it does not explain why the Asian races do not have this gene.

Anyway, it is a little pet theory that I will one day follow through with some hard research, unless someone has already done this.

Reply to
Goat Tosser

Well Trev, I guess you'll just have to study hard at bible school to get a

1 - 1 wine/water ratio like JC did.

Seriously though, no rinse sterilisers and bottle washering machines should reduce your water usage. You could use the chemical-free portion to water your garden.

Mike

Reply to
Mike

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