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It turns out, wine is useful beyond human consumption.

It is also used as a sustainable fuel.

In fact, Prince Charles just revealed that the rather delicious secret recipe he uses to power his Aston Martin is wine and cheese.

The British royal has been driving his beloved car for over five decades now, but just converted it to run on the special fuel called E85.

It is made specifically from what he describes as “surplus English white wine and whey from the cheese process”, per an exclusive interview given to the BBC:

Euro News notes that E85 typically refers to a fuel blend of 85% bioethanol and 15% unleaded petrol:

Bioethanol, or simply ‘ethanol’, is a renewable energy source made by fermenting the sugar and starch components of plant byproducts.

This would usually come from sugarcane and crops like grain, using yeast, but could also be made using the Prince’s wine and cheese combination.

You can buy a device to convert the fuel you use to bioethanol fuel if you want to reduce the CO2 emissions of your petrol car, but don’t want to buy a brand new car designed to run on bioethanol.

The conversion is a big initial investment, but ultimately, ethanol fuel costs significantly less to produce than fossil fuels like oil, so it should save you money down the line.

Plus, E85 can also help your engine to run cleaner and can even make it silent.

If a British Royal is doing it, then so are automakers and energy giants all over the world.

Some of them are rethinking the environmental impact of motorsports, like Formula 1, which is developing its own 100% sustainable fuel to save the internal combustion engine.

Although F1 isn’t using wine, the world’s oldest endurance race, the 24 Hours of Le Mans, plans to with next year’s edition expected to have a win in a car powered by wine dregs, reports Bloomberg:

Oil major TotalEnergies SE said August 20 that it’s developing its own 100% renewable fuel for motorsport which will be introduced from next year, including at the 24 Hours of Le Mans race in France, where the car that covers the greatest distance in a full day wins.

The so-called advanced ethanol fuel is made in part with residues from the French wine industry, such as wine lees and grape pomace.

That’s cool and all, but for most of us, wine is still best experienced in our mouths and in our tummies.

It would be so difficult to see a good bottle of Anthonij Rupert’s L’Ormarins wines – some of which are made to bring a distinctly South African take on iconically French wine styles – go down in a car engine.

L’Ormarins as a brand has a deep history, which can only really be felt with a few slow sips from one of the many wines available in the range.

It’s not really the kind of wine you want sloshing around in your engine as you zoot around the corners on Chapman’s Peak.

To really add some more distinction to L’Ormarins, it received a trio of medals at the Amorim Cork South Africa Cap Classique Awards ceremony for 2021:

 

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In fact, the L’Ormarins Brut Classique NV and Brut Classique Rosé NV cases are on promotion from now until December.

The cases are on sale for R795 a pop.

[sources:euronews&bloomberg]