(Wines&Vines) - Several of the innovation awards at this year’s SIMEI conference went to machines or new technology designed to help winemakers improve their wines while reducing resource consumption or improving energy efficiency.

An expert panel of 27 judges comprised of 12 Italian researchers, 12 leaders in the Italian wine industry and three other European academic experts sorted through submissions by companies exhibiting at the show. As part of the 2015 SIMEI focus on sustainability, the judges sought to honor “innovations conceived with special care for economic, environmental and ethic-social sustainability, while achieving an improvement in the quality of enological products.”

The companies that won awards received special recognition at a reception held at the Fiera Milano exhibition grounds Tuesday night. Held every two years, SIMEI runs through Friday.

Three of the four top innovation awards went to filtration companies, and the fourth was a nutrient-addition system designed to optimize fermentation.

The four innovation award winners were:

 Alfa Laval: Foodec Centrifuges clarify musts at the initial stage of processing to decrease the amount of time and energy needed to settle out solids from juice and musts and reduce the need for filtering of finished wine. The new centrifuges are the result of a collaboration of Alfa Laval and clarification specialist Juclas.

Diemme Enologia: Spin Filters for lees, must and wine use disc-shaped polymeric membranes of PVD mounted on stainless steel shafts. The filter can handle high-solids materials such as juice or lees containing bentonite or heavy lees from fermentation.

TMCI Padovan: Terminator is a dynamic rotary tangential finishing filter that can recover wine quality filtrate from the concentrated lees produced by the company’s line of Dynamos filters. The new filter is designed to require little water or energy to reduce the loss of product from racking and filtration.

HTS Enologia: Bionica, a dosing system for organic nutrients needed by yeast during fermentation. The system employs a monitoring system that tracks carbon dioxide correlated with a computerized “dynamic analysis of fermentation kinetics” to add just the right amount of nutrients at just the right time. SIMEI also honored 17 companies for debuting new technology at the show.

Astro: VEGA, a secure, anti-tampering preventative closure.

Dal Cin: “Light-no-Struck” process to limit production of riboflavin that can produce flaws in bottled white and rosé wines that are exposed to direct sunlight.

Diemme Enologia: QC 620, continuous grape processing system that includes a vibratory system, perstalic pump and press.

DR Wine Tech: “RiCaMo” filling system to bottle wine free of frothing, oxygen exposure or contact between wine and filling spout.

GAI Macchine Imbottigliatrici: Linear pneumatic bottling monoblock.

Ghidi Metalli: Onda fermentation management tank.

Gruppo Bertolaso: Optical end-of-line inspection system for filled bottles.

Innotec Tecnologie Innovative: Nitroinser, “intensive” rinsing system that employs gas-enriched water to produce “micro explosions” on contact with the interior surface of the bottle.

Maselli Misure: Inline carbon dioxide measurement device.

 Nomacorc: ZEST! closure for sparkling wine. Nomacorc: Nomasense CO2 P2000 system for measuring carbon dioxide levels in wine in the cellar. Nomacorc: Nomasense Polyscan B200 handheld unit for polyphenol analysis in the cellar or vineyard.

PE Labellers: Self-adjusting label splicer for label rolls with varying spaces between each label. Parsec: TopTube Filler, device to monitor and gas a partially filled tank to prevent oxidation.

Siprem International: Hybrid extraction system that can cool grapes with carbon dioxide or nitrogen and then provide pre-fermentation extraction through intense pressure.

Tecme International: Vibrating harvest trailer that also can be filled with inert gas to prevent oxidiation.

Velo Acciai: Mod TLS, lees filter with two, four, six or eight stainless steel tubular membranes.

All of the innovation award winners will be covered in greater detail in an Il Corriere Vinicolo report that will be published in a future print edition of Wines & Vines.