Lanchester Wines says carbon offsetting isn’t enough

By Michelle Perrett

Published: 28 October, 2021

Lanchester Wines has called on businesses in the wine industry to commit to making changes to minimise the impact on the environment, arguing that being carbon neutral is only the beginning of the journey towards sustainability.

The call comes on the eve of COP26 Glasgow, the UN climate change conference, which aims to bring parties together to accelerate action over the environment.

Lanchester Wines is now challenging its peers to identify their own personal opportunities, and then committing to making changes.

“There is no ‘one size fits all’ solution when it comes to sustainability” explains Lanchester Wines director of

sales, Mark Roberts. “It is up to individual business to identify which changes can be made to lessen their impact on the planet.”

“Carbon offsetting is a good start but we must move beyond this and look at our opportunities to cut carbon. No matter how big or small the commitment, every little change is working in the right direction,” he said.

“For us, the greatest opportunity to make a change has been through minimising our reliance on fossil fuels. As such, we’ve invested over £8m in renewable heat and energy generation at our sites across the North East of England and today our business is powered almost completely by renewable wind and solar energy and we are also a net contributor to the grid,” he added.

Four years ago, Lanchester Wines introduced heat pump technology at its warehouses in Gateshead, which uses water from disused mines hundreds of feet under the ground to create heat.

Lanchester Wines also operates two Open Loop Water Source Heat Pumps with a combined capacity of four million watts of heat to keep its 33,445m2 (360,000 ft2) of warehousing at an ambient temperature, which is perfect for the storage of wine.

It has also installed movement sensitive lights which turn off when a room isn’t in use, and reflective windows to help control room temperature.

Through working with Hillebrand, Lancaster Wine moves containers to Greencroft Bottling facility via Port of Tyne in Newcastle or Teesport near Middlesbrough, rather than bringing them through Felixstowe and Tilbury.

This saves 45% in carbon emissions using north-eastern ports compared to bringing products by rail from the south and saves 68% in carbon emissions compared to bringing products by road from Felixstowe.

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