Taking action

The 2023 Bottle Weight Accord

We report on an important agreement across the wine world, co-funded by The Wine Society.

Amy Matthews

Amy Matthews

Bottles

Last week, the Sustainable Wine Roundtable launched the Bottle Weight Accord, a project which The Wine Society was proud to co-fund as part of our work on sustainability. 

As highlighted by Jancis Robinson and other key wine trade leaders, it’s been proven that the single biggest source of carbon emissions in the wine industry is the glass bottle, a combination of the emissions from transporting and from its manufacture. The purpose of the accord therefore is to get agreement between major voices and forces across the global wine trade to reduce the weight of wine bottles. 

The Roundtable conducted extensive research with organisations and individuals across the wine trade on the challenges of reducing bottle weight (cost, fragility and so on), looked at customer perceptions (for example, concerns that lighter bottles equal lower quality wine), and reached a proposal.  

The recommendation is that retail members of the Roundtable agree to reducing the average weight of the 750ml wine bottles they sell from the current average of approximately 550 grams to an average bottle weight below 420 grams by the end of 2026. 

Dom de Ville, director of sustainability and social impact for The Wine Society, took part in the launch event. “Carbon emissions from glass bottles make up around 30% of our total emissions as a business, so reducing glass bottle weight is a key way that we can reach our goal of halving total emissions by 2032.”  says Dom. “What we really want is everybody in wine to join this, whether you’re a producer in Australia or a retailer in Chile. This is something that has the potential to be truly transformational in the wine sector by reducing carbon emissions, and potentially being a leading industry around the world in decarbonisation.” 

Read the report in full here: Reducing Wine Bottle Weight (sustainablewine.co.uk) 

Amy Matthews

Freelance Editor

Amy Matthews

Amy is currently a freelance editor, helping The Wine Society keep its Sustainability Hub fresh and alive with interesting stories. She has worked in wine for nearly twenty years for importers, wine bar groups and national retailers, as well as freelance drinks writing and content consultancy.

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