Drink box wine, cut your carbon

It’s Friday, so Greenbang’s mind naturally turns to several glasses of red. As you, dear readers, are well aware, Greenbang is always on the hunt for the most innovative ways of tackling environmental issues so with both that and a tasty shiraz in mind, for your benefit, she’d like to highlight this bit of clever green thinking from wine makers The Wine Group.

How can you make your wine more carbon neutral? Why, take it out of a bottle and stick it in a box, of course! What better way to impress friends and loved ones at a party than to turn up with some box wine and point out not only are you classy enough to bring several litres of wine to a soireé, but you’re also ever so environmentally friendly, naturally.

Here’s the thinking behind the drinking:

The historic Almaden and Inglenook brands will no longer be packaged in large, carbon-inefficient 3L and 4L glass jugs and will immediately move to Bag-in-Box (BIB) packaging. BIB packages weigh significantly less than glass and require far less carbon-based energy to transport.[…]

The announcement was made today by The Wine Group, Inc. Both wine brands, purchased in February 2008 from Constellation Wines U.S., are moving to BIB packaging which will save 11 million pounds in packaging waste and reduce the brands’ carbon footprint by 60%.[…]

“The positive impact to the environment from making the shift to BIB packages will be huge, simply because the volume of these two brands combined account for ten million cases of production,” notes David Kent, CEO of The Wine Group. “We believe that making this change with two such venerable brands is an important step forward for the environment and for consumers who appreciate quality, value and the lessened impact on the environment.”

In celebration, Greenbang will be playing a spot of goon of fortune.