Moores Hill – Tasmania’s First Off-Grid Winery

Moores Hill is clearly not a large wine company – with just 7 hectares of vines, total production is a few thousand cases each year. Despite its size, this small business has taken a leadership role in the area of sustainability by building Tasmania’s first 100% off grid winery.

Moores Hill has just completed its second vintage of ‘solar powered wine’, gathering all its energy needs from 108 solar panels on the roof and 81kWh of high-performance gel battery storage.

Marketing & Cellar Door Manager, Fiona Weller said:

“The use of renewable energy to make wine is clear point of difference in a competitive market place. 

 

There are more than 30 cellar doors on the Tamar Valley Wine Route; visitors will choose us over others because they’ve read that our wine is off-grid and sustainability is important to them when making purchasing decisions.”

 

Winemaker Julian Allport said:

“In a normal winery, you just turn chillers and pumps on without worrying about how much power you’re using. But I can’t do that here.

 

Instead you start thinking about all the little quality points in the process and how you can save energy and time. And that could lead to better wine.

 

From a financial perspective, we’ve added a 100 tonne capacity winery to our property but our power bills have not increased. We reckon we would spend $20K a year in power to run a winery like this.”

Moores Hill have won a number awards over the past 12 months:

• Launceston Chamber of Commerce Business Excellence Awards – Business of the Year
• Innovative Process Award at the Innovative Tasmania Awards – for Winemaking in an Off-Grid Winery
• Award for Best Environmental Practice for an Off-grid Winery at the Launceston Chamber of Commerce Business Excellence Awards
• Silver at the Tasmanian Tourism Awards
• Special Achievement in Construction at the Master Builders Awards