The environmental role of small organic wineries: the case study of a multi-year assessment of a local Italian red wine

Sustainability and effective eco-innovation strategies should be based on scientific evidence. Research on small organic winery impacts and their contextual and driver factors could improve the understanding of the role of small organic farms on the ecological transition of the European agri-food system. To analyze in a comprehensive manner the environmental impacts of organic viticulture, identifying and ranking the environmental hotspots and their variability, the adoption of a multi-year approach is crucial.

An LCA study explored the environmental implications of a local Italian red wine produced with organic method by a small family wine farm, considering four winemaking years. Adopting a “from cradle to farm gate” approach and the Environmental Footprint 3.0 method, impacts related to both a 0.75-L bottle and 1 kg of grape were estimated using specific farm data. Climate and meteorological conditions were analyzed using a 30-year dataset (1991–2020) from the nearest and representative weather station. After normalizing, weighing, and ranking the LCA results by percentage contribution, the impact categories that contributed at least 80% of the total score for all production years were selected. The correlation and interannual variation of inputs, outputs, and environmental performance were discussed using descriptive statistics.

Fertilizer, pesticide, and power use showed high interannual variability that did not seem greatly affected by weather conditions and variability. Climate change was the most important of the nine relevant impact categories that showed large variation between production years. Particulate matter, terrestrial eutrophication, and marine eutrophication showed the highest coefficient of variation and resulted to be strongly correlated with nitrogen (N) and phosphorus—expressed as phosphorus pentoxide (P₂O₅) content—application doses. Grape production represented the main impacting phase, driven by soil fertilization and management. Glass bottle also represented a hotspot, in particular for climate change and both resource use categories, as well as pesticide treatments (diesel use for spreading). Finally, grape farmer choices, particularly in terms of soil management methods, played a decisive role in the variability of environmental impacts.

The main solutions for limiting interannual variability of production and improving the environmental performance of the wine case study are (i) reducing fertilizer emissions by adopting a robust soil management strategy, (ii) limiting diesel use and pesticide treatments, (iii) optimizing grape yields using precision irrigation systems. This study highlighted the importance of (i) considering multiple production years to characterize the sustainability of organic wines, and (ii) ensuring adequate technical support for improving organic small farms.