Lasers to overtake manual sorting in hi-tech Bordeaux
October 14, 2009
Jane Anson in Bordeaux, and Panos Kakaviatos
Manual sorting tables will soon be a thing of the past as the top chateaux embrace 100,000 laser sorting technology.
New sorting machines, using laser optics, have been introduced at Chateau Pavie and Chateau Grand Corbin Despagne, and Chateau Margaux has an entirely new gravity-led reception system for the grapes, taking them first in small trays and then by a pulley system into the vats.
Manual destemming, which first made an appearance in Bernard Magrez's Pape Clement a few years ago, has been seen this year in Château Angélus.
Other new developments include the construction of new drainage systems at Chateau Bélair-Monange in St Emilion and at Chateau Pichon Comtesse de Lalande in Pauillac.
At Chateau Angelus, where 50 gloved workers de-stemmed the bunches grape by grape, owner Hubert de Bouard said the almost entirely unscathed grapes made sorting tables almost redundant.
According to Jean Bernard Grenié, co-owner of Angélus, this technique will add around 2 per bottle.
By contrast, at Chateau Léoville Barton in St Julien, where the harvest was dropped from a dumper truck onto a single sorting table before machine de-stemming and fermentation in wooden vats, technical director François Brehant said that manual de-stemming is 'good for unemployment'.
Chateau Pavie is working for the first year with a new sorting table that removes the stalks far more gently than previous generations of machines, and then passes the grapes through an optic camera to eliminate those without pre-determined quality factors such as sufficient must weight.
This new breed of sorting machines start at around 100,000. They have been gaining acceptance over the past years.
'In five years, the idea of manual sorting will be unthinkable,' said Pavie owner Gerard Perse.
'But we must remember after a certain point, we can't make any more difference to the grapes. Many intervention techniques are used only to impress the neighbours, not to really improve the wine.'
Meanwhile, at Chateau Margaux the gravity system was complemented by an entirely new barrel room, where eight new wooden vats, and 14 stainless steel tanks from 30 to 150 hectolitres will allow more precise parcel-by-parcel vinification.
'The change will only be incremental,' explained managing director Paul Pontallier, 'but with the excellence of this vintage, we are feeling very positive.'
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Jane Anson's and Panos Kakaviatos' article about one of the latest techniques having been developed once again here in Bordeaux is an interesting one.
There are, however, a few undoubtedly involuntary inaccuracies and omissions that may be worth pointing out to your numerous readers.
1) The price of the laser-guided optical sorting machines, coupled with a destemmer, is closer to 120,000 Euros.
2) Two manufacturers supply these machines: Pellenc (used by Gérard Perse at Pavie and his other properties). This is not the first year that Perse has used this machine. On the contrary, he has played an active role in its development over the last four vintages at his properties in the Côtes de Castillon appellation. The other is Vaslin Bucher. This latter machine is being used by the dynamic team of Nicolas Thienpont and Stéphane Derenoncourt at a number of the properties where they are responsible for vineyard management and winemaking (the most recent and welcome addition to their "stable" being Beauséjour-Duffau). It is also being used by the Moueixs at a number of their properties in Pomerol (Pétrus) and Saint Emilion (Belair Monange). Silvio Denz, who recently inaugurated his spectacular new cellar designed by Italo-Swiss architect, Mario Botta, is also using this system.
3) Manual destemming did not first make an appearance at Pape Clément. The technique was first used in 1997 at Château de la Négly and Clos des Truffiers in the Languedoc (!) and at Michel Gracia's eponymous property in Saint Emilion. Credit given where credit due.
4) One might ask why do we manually sort and destem? To create jobs as suggested by François Bréhant at Léoville-Barton? No, I think not. The primary reason is to get rid of any gray rot-afflicted fruit. By doing such manual sorting, we can afford to wait longer to harvest in order to achieve the vaunted phenological ripeness, while concurrently assuming the risk of the development of gray rot. However, manual destemming of berries with gray rot does have a significant, if rarely talked about, downside: it releases enzymes contained in the ignoble rot itself. These are nefarious to proper, "clean" fermentations and may cause color to "fall out" of the fermented wine. This is why some properties that may have once done manual sorting are now using the best mechanical destemmers on the market, doing a manual bunch sorting before destemming and individual berry sorting after the fruit has been destemmed mechanically. This is usually performed in the serious estates in two phases, once on a vibrating sorting table where the berries look something like Mexican jumping beans, then on a relatively slow moving conveyor belt. This belt then deposits the sorted berries on yet another conveyor belt that moves the whole berries to the tops of the fermenters into which they fall by gravity alone, either lightly crushed (as at Fleur Cardinale) or as whole berries (the Derenoncourt method). In so far as the new laser-guided optical sorters are coupled with gentle but efficient mechanical destemmers, it is clear that the need for manual destemming and table sorting will be reduced more to a marketing technique than to a reliable means of getting ripe and healthy fruit quickly (avoiding premature oxidation) into the fermenters.
5) Had the authors of this article queried Gérard Perse a bit more about his pioneering work with optical scanning, they might also have discovered that the next major breakthrough in this field may well be the use of scanner/sorters using ultrasound. These may prove capable not only of sorting fruit based on healthy aspect, ripeness (color), and size, but also on the actual potential alcoholic percentage (sugar content)! Jeffrey M. Davies, Gérant, Signature Selections
A really fabulous and most interesting post or answer from Jeffrey M. Davies on the article mentioned in subject on Decanter.com.
Really worth while maybe to consecrate a more elaborated full article on this?
Thanks for more information like this. Dirk-Antoon Samyn
After watching several optical sorters and receiving lines in Bordeaux
processing different varieties of grapes for a few weeks, I would like
to add a few points to this discussion:
1. The optical sorter is one step in the total system -- from cutting
the bunch from the vine to its eventual arrival in tank. I have seen
careful selection and beautiful bunches enter the receiving line on
one end, and wet, choppy grapes emerging on the other, and a bin
holding a quite sizeable rejection load. The systems need to be
calibrated so that the requirements to achieve an automated, optically
sorted batch do not create too many false positives, or rupture too
many grapes and lose great juice along the way.
2. Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cab Franc and Petit Verdot did not all
react the same way to the speed and physical manipulation of the new
gauntlet, due to variances in skin thicknesses, berry plumpness,
ripeness variability, and weight. The grapes are hurled along at high
velocity, and not every contact point is gel-coated, remains sanitary
and is able to treat a noble berry with perfect respect!
3. When the sorter is offline, and grapes are still arriving at the
receiving line, the chateaux still needs to be a viable Plan B. The
deepest pockets will have redundant lines, so please double your cost
assumptions, or plan to have the previous system/labor available as a
back-up. These are complicated mechanical devices, and they will go
out for unscheduled maintenance.
It's a good start, but more needs to be done at the manufacturer and
the system integration level so that this new investment doesn't
create its own host of problems. It is easy to process a large batch
quickly, and at the wrong reject rate. And, I should add, the
manufacturers need to improve the methods used to clean various
components on site, to simplify proper sanitation and maintenance
regimes such that the process can be easily restored to pristine
"first batch of the morning" condition every time.
The better test will come when the grapes aren't as uniformly
spectacular as we have seen in 2009. Miguel Lecuona, Bordeaux, France
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