Advancing Efficiency in Water-Energy Nexus of Wineries: A Critical Review and Proposed Measures for Smart Monitoring and Sustainable Management

The wine industry, with its high resource demands, is facing increasing pressure to improve operational sustainability by reducing water and energy use due to climate change, limited resources, and changing regulations. This study is a critical narrative review that followed a structured literature identification and screening approach to synthesise evidence on monitoring, instrumentation, and digital solutions for water and energy efficiency in vineyards and wineries. The review and critical analysis focus on sensor technologies, IoT-based systems, and smart management platforms applicable to the winemaking process. The evidence highlights the underexplored water–energy nexus within the wine sector, demonstrating bidirectional dependencies and potential co-benefits of integrated resource management, particularly in water-intensive and energy-intensive operations (e.g., cleaning/CIP, cooling/refrigeration, and pumping). Despite advancements in agriculture and industrial sectors, the integration of smart monitoring systems in wineries remains limited due to fragmented implementation, lack of standardized indicators, and socioeconomic barriers affecting scalability. Based on the synthesis, this work proposes actionable measures and implementation pathways, including baseline metering and sub-metering with clear KPIs, real-time monitoring and anomaly/leak detection, optimisation of cleaning/CIP and cooling control, water reuse/recycling opportunities, and integrated energy management via dashboards/decision-support tools to enable data-driven operation. These findings help bridge technical innovations with practical adoption pathways, supporting the transition toward sustainable, low-impact, and climate-resilient wine production.