ENERGY SAVING AND SUSTAINABILITY

THE PROJECT BY JAMIN-UWW (UNDERWATERWINES) WE ARE PART OF

The protected marine area of Portofino, at Cala degli Inglesi, is Jamin’s laboratory to study and to implement protocols for the underwater ageing of wines and spirits in general.
No cellars, barrels, cement tanks or steel vats: just the sea taking care of our bottles laid more than 50 metres underwater as part of Jamin’s 2022 study phase. To trace the origins of this preservation technique, we should go back to the ancient Greeks who precisely used the underwater environment to preserve the first ‘wine masses’ of that time as a natural refrigerator. On the other hand, if we consider the modern era, we start in 2004 with Perèz, a Spanish producer, who experimentally approached the underwater ageing of his wines, observing a new characterisation from the sensory point of view.
However, it was not until 2015, with the establishment of Jamin, an engineering services company for the development of underwater refining techniques and technology, that the breakthrough came.
Specifically in terms of technologies, the bottles Jamin aged underwater are equipped with a real tracking and anti-counterfeiting system (track & safe) based on blockchain, a technique that protects the uniqueness of the bottle and collects information starting from the agronomic sphere up to the direction taken during underwater ageing. This allows the consumer to discover the characteristics and to trace the origin of the product even after the immersion, favouring a narrative and a control tool also of the quality conditions of the preservation.

Jamin’s project benefits from the technical support of the Department of Agricultural Science and Technology of the University of Florence, the Department of Earth, Environmental and Life Sciences of the University of Genoa, and from the technical team of experienced Sommeliers, the head of the sensory tasting panel that certifies UWW (UnderWaterWines) being the Former President of AIS Italy. These important partnerships, in a scientific and analytical approach, have made it possible to develop this technique to the full, applying it to every single product or reference being analysed.

Jamin’s goal is to create and to preserve a new category of products, the UnderWaterWines -UWW, which, according to experts, have different and surprising organoleptic, taste and olfactory properties in comparison with wines aged in traditional cellars, providing a new quality offer in terms of environmental sustainability.

Label selection is fundamental for Jamin: an accurate selection, a search for those who, like them, make sustainability and a quality approach not limited to external appearance be their ‘cornerstones’, with innovation and passion.
We, Tenuta Campo al Signore, were among the first ones who believed in the project and received the UWW certification, with our bottles being plunged and bringing primacy to the Bolgherese designation: we were the first ones at Bolgheri who carried out this type of ageing for our Rosato DOC Bolgheri 2018 (60% Sangiovese, 40% Merlot) and for our Rosso DOC Bolgheri 2018 (Merlot single variety vinification).

Tenuta Campo al Signore has always been committed to sustainability, and Jamin, with its project, proposes a sustainable model with an ageing method aiming to reduce land consumption and CO² emissions by means of traditional energy-intensive systems, encouraging, with the support of the study by Distav of Genoa, a zero-impact approach that guarantees the protection of natural areas and energy savings, by using natural resources such as underwater environments.

And it is precisely about energy saving that we want to talk to you today. The 18th of February is a day of the year dedicated to raising awareness for the environment through the International Energy Saving Day, which aims to remind everyone, companies, and private citizens alike, of the important role they can play on a daily basis in safeguarding the environment and the health of the entire planet, fighting the serious problem of climate change by means of practical actions.

The UnderWaterWines-UWW are an example of the way quality and sustainability can be combined. Immersion into the sea makes it possible to have a lower underwater temperature than at the surface, but it is constant: that creates a naturally refrigerated environment which is ideal for bottles. There is no need, therefore, to adjust temperature and humidity with air conditioners, nor to create land structures thermally insulated from the outside. This is the way this method saves a lot of energy and has a positive global impact.

Thanks to a significant reduction in environmental impact, air conditioning costs and mechanical processing, sea naturally provides, when applied, the right rules of immersion: an environment with constant temperature, perfect humidity and absence of light, sea currents gently caressing bottles: the ideal environment for wine ageing. Jamin’s underwater cellar in Tuscany will soon be ready and we will be among the first users.

Writte by
Elena Ninci – sales and marketing Tenuta Campo al Signore