Low Preservative Wines and Preservative Free Wines

The word “preservative” refers to protecting the wine from microbial contamination or spoilage by unwanted bacteria, moulds and yeast. These unwanted bacteria, moulds and yeast either naturally occur on the grapes (and therefore naturally in the grape juice) or enter the juice during harvesting or winemaking. Microbial spoilage will make the wine smell and taste unpleasant

Most winemakers use preservatives, e.g. sulfur dioxide, to prevent and/or delay microbial spoilage.

Now, grape juice contains natural preservatives. So wine naturally contains a small amount of sulfur dioxide (10 - 50 mg/L), as it is produced by the yeast during the fermentation stage of winemaking. This means there is technically no such thing as a "preservative free wine".

But, you still often hear the terms "Preservative Free Wines" or "Low Preservative Wines" used. Both terms are referring to wines that have had no preservatives added during the winemaking process, i.e. the preservative content in the wine is only the naturally occurring sulfur dioxide.

Preservatives in Organic Wines?

My understanding of organic wine is that essentially no chemicals are used in the vineyard to grow the grapes and minimal chemicals are used in the winemaking process.

However to be certified organic, an organic wine may still have sulfur dioxide added as a preservative. And in fact, most organic wine producers actually do add preservatives to their wines. We have found though that most organic winemakers tend to add about 50% less preservative than non-organic producers.

So in summary, organic wines and preservative free wines are not necessarily related. This is because it is still possible for an organic wine producer to choose to add preservatives during the winemaking process.

On the other hand, a preservative free wine may be made from grapes that are not classed as organic.