Camille Chandès writes in L’Usine Nouvelle about the efforts of Moët-Hennessy Champagne to improve its energy efficiency. The company felt it was quite a challenge because of the age-old techniques they have used to produce one of the world’s most famous champagnes. What is good to see is that all new investments now require an assessment of their energy component. This is a lesson that all companies need to learn.
Champagne converts to energy efficiency
In 2011, Moët-Hennessy Champagne & Services set out to improve its energy efficiency – a real technical and human challenge when working with traditional products.
It takes a visit to the wine cellars in Epernay (Marne) where the famous Moët & Chandon champagne has been produced since 1743, to realize how tradition now lives alongside environmental concerns. Moët-Hennessy Champagne & Services (MHCS) – the holding company for the four champagne houses Moët & Chandon, Veuve Clicquot, Krug and Ruinart that belong to LVMH – decided to take on a complex project: reducing energy consumption in the production of its champagnes. This is by far the most energy-consuming part of MHCS. Of the 62 sites it owns in Champagne (comprising 53 vines, 6 production sites, 9 wine-making sites and 13 wine-pressing sites), the production sites account for nearly 80% of its electricity consumption, mainly in the two months of the year during grape harvest. This is a real technical and human challenge for a company that uses centuries-old processes to produce its luxury wines.
MHCS began its efforts to improve energy performance in 2011. After trying several unconnected in-house initiatives, the company finally decided to hire a consulting firm to help structure its approach. They chose Okavango-Energy. “We had two aims: to work on the technical side and to encourage the active involvement of the employees,” explains Michel Feutry, the head of maintenance at MHCS.
The first step was to check the levels of consumption. “We set up an indicator for target consumption based on the production volumes and the outside temperature,” says Christopher Roland, director of the Okavango project. Monitoring was done either manually or automatically. Each house has its own dashboard. “We did not impose any technological solutions, just the results were important,” says Michel Feutry. To promote environmental awareness and good work practices by technicians, we established some priority sites for the most energy consuming areas. The idea? “The technicians and oenologists spent a half-day identifying the areas for improvement according to themes and made proposals,” explains Christophe Roland. Although the majority of employees supported the project, reconsidering all aspects of production in order to track energy waste was certainly not easy. Each house has its own ways of operating, passed down over centuries. “We had to convince them that temperatures could be increased between 1 and 2 degrees without compromising the oenological processes. That shook up the received wisdom quite a bit,” says Christophe Roland.
The first measures were initiated at the sites, starting with refrigeration equipment. Champagne production requires working at low temperatures to regulate the fermentation processes (- 4 to – 6 ° C) and for the unchoking phase (when the bottle comes out of the cellar, the bottleneck is kept at – 28 ° C). The heat lost by the cooling units is now recovered for the production of hot water. Another key area of energy consumption is air circulation. With the introduction of automated ventilation systems in the cellars, the loss of heat to the outside is reduced. Finally, there are also changes in the lighting: especially, opening up walls in the cellars to let in a maximum of natural light, directing lighting to strategic locations, and LED lighting – which is not suitable everywhere. “LED lighting is not suitable for aging wines in the cellars. We have been working for two years in R & D to find a solution,” said Michel Feutry. In total, MHCS envisages a budget of 300,000 euros over five years for this new energy efficiency program.
10% SAVINGS IN ONE YEAR
The results are there. While MHCS had set a target of 20% reduction in energy consumption between 2012 and 2016, the company has already achieved 10% savings in the first year. “To go beyond the 20% target, much bigger investment is necessary because we will need to address the energy performance of the buildings themselves,” says Michel Feutry.
In order to ensure that all these efforts are not reversed by future industrial investments, every request for investment now includes an energy component (calculation of energy cost by suppliers, conducting a thermal study as part of any building renovation …). “Before buying cooling or compressed air systems, we now ask ourselves more than ever before: do we really need them? And if so, how do we ensure their best design? How do we get their best energy performance?” said Michel Feutry. Building on the success of improvements made in energy consumption, MHCS now plans a similar program to reduce its water consumption.
Energy in Demand - Sustainable Energy - Rod Janssen 