Climate change is having an increasing impact on all agricultural production systems, including the wine sector. Therefore, climate adaptation and mitigation strategies are needed to preserve the production of local varieties without reducing wine yield and quality. At the same time, there is a growing consumer demand for more sustainable wines, requiring investments in cleaner technologies and eco-efficiency, but without major changes in traditional practices, formalized and protected by EU quality systems.

AEB, collaborating with the best research centers and universities around the world, is actively engaged in R&D to ensure the production of a sustainable wine.   

Precisely for this purpose, in 2020, AEB's experts, in collaboration with California State University (Fresno, USA), carried out a research in order to identify an alternative to the use of bentonite, a natural product widely spread by now, but which can contribute to decrease the aromatic notes as well as not being re-usable in the wine making process.

Several more secure and sustainable materials have been tested: these include non-traditional yeast strains (S. paradoxus), existing clarifying agents such as carboxymethylcellulose (CMC) and Chitocel, a fungal chitosan, or innovative ones such as polystyrene. The results have shown that there is great potential to deliver more sustainable practices. But much more can be done to optimize dosages and applications. And we at AEB are at the forefront of this continuous process of improving biotechnology and quality wine production.

Full open access article:
Sommer, S.; Tondini, F. Sustainable Replacement Strategies for Bentonite in Wine Using Alternative Protein Fining Agents. Sustainability 2021, 13, 1860. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13041860