Burning Hawk Wines & Sustainable Practices

Since the idea for Burning Hawk Wines was first conceived we have been committed to thoughtful resource stewardship and sustainability practices. From the get go it was important that this wine brand, once developed, would make a difference “Out There” in the world of wildlife and resource conservation but also “In Here” within our own organization’s practices and processes. Below are a few highlights and anecdotes regarding our project and our products in terms of resource stewardship and sustainability practices.

Initial Assessment
In the early days of the Burning Hawk Wine project the project founder Nick Papadopoulos personally interviewed each primary member of the winemaking supply chain, from vineyard manger to winemaker and CEO to understand their practices and commitments in terms of the 3 E’s of sustainability (Environmental Stewardship, Social Equity and Economic Viability). It was determined that Windsor Vineyards and Girard Winery were progressive in terms of resource stewardship and sustainability and committed to continuous improvement. Below are some of the facts that support this early decision and our ongoing improvements as an environmentally and socially responsible wine brand

Green My Vino, Renewable Energy & Climate Change
50 cents from every bottle of Burning Hawk Wines sold helps drive the transition to renewable energy in California. This came about as a result of the Burning Hawk Wines team co-founding the Green My Vino Facebook application with Village Green Energy and as a result we became the first wine brand in the world to be launched on Facebook. Burning Hawk Wines and our co-founding wineries Iron Horse Vineyards, Windsor Vineyards, Girard Winery and others helped stimulate a massive number of Facebook members to get involved in greening California wineries from a renewable energy perspective. The massive involvement of Facebook users led to Burning Hawk wines and Windsor Vineyards to purchase enough certified green and renewable energy to go carbon neutral at the winery. We are proud of the small role we played in co-founding the Green My Vino project with Village Green Energy and other wineries. Not only has this helped us massively reduce our carbon footprint and help with Climate Change but it has stimulated awareness and change in the wine community.

The Vineyard & Growing Grapes
The grapes from Burning Hawk Wines are grown by one of wine country’s leading vineyard managers, Silverado Farming This organization focuses on cultivating grapes of outstanding quality from small properties which are carefully managed from a sustainability and stewardship perspective. Silverado is known throughout Sonoma & Napa wine country for one of the most progressive employee education and compensation programs, their funding of farm worker housing and their watershed and resource management practices. Some of these practices include:

• All vineyards cultivated using organic, biodynamic or sustainable practices

• Precision irrigation techniques are used to maximize water efficiency and make sure that only the water that is needed is used for irrigation

• Advanced erosion control techniques to improve soil health and minimize erosion to the waterways

• Use of permanent, nitrogen and nutrient-rich cover crops to boost soil vitality instead of the use of synthetic fertilizers

• Developing vineyard habitat to encourage birds of prey living in or near the vineyard. This not only aligns with our mission to promote birdlife conservation but also helps control rodent populations in place of synthetic pesticides and rodenticides.

• In fact, there are powerlines near one of our vineyards, The Crocker Vineyard, which we discovered had been retrofitted to be raptor safe.

The Winery - Crafting Burning Hawk Wines

The winery where Burning Hawk Wines are crafted has been recognized by the Resource Solutions Group, a 3rd party resource management company responsible for improving the efficiency of the wine industry

“The facility is a good example where efficient building design and energy efficient equipment improve overall operations, reduce costs and support the winery’s overall sustainability goals.”

• The winery has enrolled in the California Sustainable Winegrowing Program and has gone through the first round sustainability assessment of the SWP program.- We have conducted water and energy audits and have begun implementing efficiency measures in these areas to take what is already an advanced facility (from a resource conservation standpoint) and make it even better.

Operational Efficiency & Waste Management

• We also have a comprehensive, bi-lingual recycling program which reduce waste going to the landfill and increase the recycling and reuse of paper. This reduces our garbage bill as well.

• We have started a pilot project to see if we can help reduce plastic (shrink wrap) from the wine business. We estimate that there is enough plastic shrink wrap used in the California wine sector alone to wrap the earth 5 times at the equator! Therefore we are exploring ways to reduce this useage and act as a model

• We are researching the applicability of Combined Heat and Power Applications (CHP), Solar and other renewable energy production methods for our facilities

Employee Involvement & Continual Improvement
Burning Hawk Wines and our sister wine brands are part of the Vintage Wine Estates Family of Wines. Throughout our organization, we operate on a daily basis with an eye towards being sensitive to the environment, contributing to the community and being wise stewards of resources. We encourage dialogue and the sharing of ideas to continually improve in terms of our social and environmental practices. And most, if not all of these practices are good economically for the bottom line as well.