Is a bottle still a bottle when it's made out of paper? Or is it merely a bottle-shaped carton masquerading as the real thing? And will it take with drinkers of the vino? These are all questions brought to mind by inventor Martin Myerscough's new GreenBottle, a vessel designed to cut down on energy costs and carbon emissions in wine production.

Myerscough debuted his GreenBottle as a milk container designed to reduce landfill clutter. Your typical plastic milk jug takes up a lot of space in the dump and if it's not recycled, it never, ever goes away. And there are plenty of people who don't bother to recycle their dairy containers, so landfills fill up faster than they really should. As it stands, 40% of all plastic waste comes in the form of bottles. Myerscough wanted to cut down on that number, so he invented a completely biodegradable milk container. It works pretty much the same as your average jug; a sealed foil bag keeps the fluid in on the inside, while the outside is made of structured paper.

The same technology can be used to house wine. While glass waste isn't as big of a problem as plastic--it can be recycled and will eventually turn back into sand--glass bottles are heavy and require a lot of energy to produce and transport. A glass bottle's carbon footprint is ten times as big as the GreenBottle's, and it's ten times as heavy, too. By cutting out container weight, wine manufacturers could afford to ship out many more bottles on the same dime. The question is whether they'll want to.

It will probably depend on the manufacturer. High class wineries are definitely going to want to stick to their glass despite the extra cost because it's the only good way to preserve the flavors of quality wine. While the GreenBottle may be the same shape and size as a classy glass wine bottle, it's essentially a restructured Franzia box, using the same foil bladder technology to keep the fluid contained. You don't keep box wine in the cellar; by the same logic, you're not going to want to keep GreenBottles down there, either. The flavor probably won't age too well in that foil pouch, and I don't know how long the paper bottles remain structurally integral.

But those middle-of-the-road wines don't all need a glass bottle. You don't age Yellowtail or Barefoot in your basement. For those wines that remain a step above the box but a couple of steps below the connoisseur's selection, the GreenBottle might just be a viable container. It doesn't look half bad for a paper bottle and it's certainly nicer to the earth.