Casa Relvas receives licenses for the reuse of wastewater treated in vineyard irrigation 

Casa Relvas received the Secretary of State for the Environment, Hugo Pires, at the winery, as part of the ‘Pilot project for the reuse of wastewater treated in the irrigation of vineyards’, launched in 2019 with Águas de Portugal, and which has now completed its licensing process. The licenses, issued by the ARH (Administration of the Hydrographic Region) were thus handed over to António Relvas, who will accompany the delegation. 

He was in charge of a brief presentation of the company, and Nuno Franco – director of viticulture and oenology – presented data on water consumption in the vineyard, more specifically on irrigation efficiency (probes, PHB, Ceres; NDV, levels of production/segmentation of the vineyards, etc); and consumption in the cellar, and measures to reduce water consumption (PIGS, reuse of water for cooling laboratory equipment, floor washing, reduction of hose diameters, reduction of pressure in lifting pumps, and training for teams. 

«With the edaphoclimatic conditions of the Alentejo, and adding climate change, water is increasingly an essential and scarce commodity for quality agricultural production. Casa Relvas, in this context, and in the circular economy, started a project in 2019 with Águas de Portugal, in order to close the cycle, that is, to reuse the effluent produced in its winery, as well as the effluent from São Miguel de Machede, in the irrigation of its vineyards. Despite all the efforts to save water in the winery and to achieve precision viticulture, this contribution is crucial for good water management in vine cultivation, thus enabling excellent quality grapes to be obtained», reveals Nuno Franco. 

«That is why these licenses are so important, as they allow us to complete the project, starting to receive 80m3 daily in our dam, which will come to us directly from the WWTP of São Miguel de Machede».