GreenYour.com

Making your own wine curbs pollution linked to long-distance transport of wine and cuts down on wasteful packaging associated with store-bought wine (think heavy glass bottles).

Find it! Winemaking suppliers

Like a painter needs a brush and canvas, a home winemaker needs a fermenting bucket and carboy caps. Below is a sampling of the many vendors offering the compulsory paraphernalia required in the art of home winemaking. Basic starter kits are also available for those not yet ready to enter the more esoteric realm of malolactic bacteria and liquid champagne yeasts. The Joy of Home Winemaking also offers a thorough listing of suppliers of home winemaking equipment and accoutrement.

• E.C. Kraus
• Fine Vine Wines
• grapestompers
• The Grape and Granary
• Homebrew Heaven

Before you buy

Learning the art of winemaking takes time and access to information. You'll want to seek specific how-to instructions from the experts—and make sure it's a hobby you can handle—before purchasing equipment and supplies. Find out how to make your own wine from start to finish with resources like:

• Trusty Guides: A basic, step-by-step guide for novice winemakers.
• Way to Make Wine: How to Craft Superb Table Wines at Home by Sheridan Warrick
• First Steps in Winemaking by C.J.J. Berry
• Bacchus and Me by novelist and wine columnist, Jay McInerney.

Making your own wine helps you go green because…

• It diminishes your carbon footprint by eliminating the need for highly polluting, fuel-intensive long-distance transport of domestic and imported wines.
• It cuts back on the cycle of waste produced when purchasing heavy glass wine bottles. You can use bottles over and over again when making wine at home.

Given the worldwide popularity of wine, chief environmental concerns surrounding the product are oil consumption and smog-creating carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxide emitted during the transportation of heavy glass wine bottles in long-haul diesel trucks. Diesel exhaust contains over 450 chemicals, 40 of them believed to be toxic to humans and detrimental to the environment. Carbon monoxide from vehicle emissions accounts for 56 percent of total carbon emissions nationwide and, along with nitrogen oxide, contributes to air pollution.[1] It's estimated that most food products, including wine, travel an average of 1,500 miles before reaching our kitchen tables.[2] Wine made, bottled, and consumed at home does not have to make this journey.

According to reports published by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 2005, 10.9 million tons of glass containers (including beer, wine, juice, soda bottles, and other products) were disposed of in the United States; just 2.8 million tons were recovered for recycling.[3] It takes a glass bottle about 1 million years to break down in a landfill.[4] Although bottling plays a part in home winemaking, it takes place on a much smaller scale, plus bottles can be reused.

External links

• Wine Making Radio
• Winemakeri - Winemaking Dictionary
• Homewine.com
• Pressed For Wine
• Youtube - Grape Lady Falls How not to crush grapes.
• Crushpad: This San Francisco-based winery teaches wine enthusiasts how to make their own wine, and allows them use of their own state of the art equipment and top-of-the-line grapes.
• Vancouver Amateur Winemakers Association (VAWA): A local home winemaking community group.
• Crush and Stomp: Based in Towson, Maryland, this group allows fellow winmakers to swap recipes and techniques and even compete with fellow enthusiasts.
• WineMaker Magazine - Directory: Lists home winemaking clubs in the US, Canada, UK, and Australia.