Wine is exported by Sail
Posted on February 26th 2008
French vineyard owners are attempting to cut carbon emissions by exporting their wine by sail. Last August 60,000 bottles of wine were shipped in the three-masted barque Belem, launched in 1896, from Languedoc to Ireland and further voyages are planned to Bristol, Manchester and even Canada.
Each trip to Dublin takes approximately four days, but saving on average 18,375 lbs of carbon. The founder of shipping company Compagnie de Transport Maritime à la Voile (CTMV), has said that the delivery times to Britain and Ireland have been calculated using historic charts, were someone has had to study a century of weather conditions to work them out.
The whole process is going to take around a week longer than it would by flight, but will save approximately 4.9oz of Carbon per bottle. The wines will firstly be delivered to Bordeaux by barge using the Canal du Garonne and du Midi, which runs through Southern France from Sete in the East, via Béziers in Languedoc. Each bottle of wine is going to be labelled ‘Carried by sailing ship, a better deal for the planet’, and despite the increase in time of transport, the wine should remain relatively cheap from £5 to £15.
Funding has been put in place towards the build of a fleet of 7 specially designed sailing ships to expand the project growth, which should all be working by 2013, with the first being launched this October.
This news story was brought to you by Insuremyboat.co.uk.
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