French Winery

Gennevilliers, France, 30th April 2014 – A winery based in the small village Boutiers-Saint-Trojan, France, is benefitting from a Panasonic VRF system which supplies exact temperature requirements for the wine making process and is achieving outstanding results.

As many wine connoisseurs will already be aware, the winemaking process is a delicate and controlled art. The pressures, pumps and presses, and most importantly, the heat, must all work to precise figures in order for a high quality product to be made.  

The winery owners had been using electricity to power the coolers required for the important fermentation process. This traditional method proved inadequate with fluctuating power supplies that provoked power cuts and affected the smooth running of the harvest.  

A temporary solution was found with the rental of a generator, but this was an expensive and short term solution. A group study was conducted, to compare gas and electricity sources for the most efficient units in terms of power and cost.  

With the results landing in gas-powered favour and with a pre-existing gas supply on the winery site, winery consulting firm, Vinithermo Consulting, specified Panasonic’s ECO G High Performance VRF System as the ideal solution.  

Panasonics VRF range is the market leader in the professional heating and cooling market. All models are noticeably easy to install and quiet to run, whilst maintaining good thermal control and a particularly high level of performance. Its annual operating costs are particularly low, suggesting a real alternative to systems running on electricity.  

Panasonics ECO G System not only works as a power supply to the wine chiller, but the engine, which is fuelled by natural gas or LPG, is also used as a heat generator for this project. The heat generated by the operation of the engine is retrieved using a specific exchanger. This is then used to preheat the domestic hot water used by the winery owners.  

"The transition from cooling to heating is performed quickly and without complication,” says winery owners, Serge Renaud and Damien. “The installation has worked throughout the harvest period of 2013 to the highest levels we have achieved and offered a good level of performance. Huge gas and energy savings have already been made in our first harvest since installing this unit with an expected return on investment being achieved within a short three years. ”