Abstract
Climate change will impose increasingly warm and dry conditions on vineyards. Wine quality and yield are strongly influenced by climatic conditions and depend on complex interactions between temperatures, water availability, plant material, and viticultural techniques. In established winegrowing regions, growers have optimized yield and quality by choosing plant material and viticultural techniques according to local climatic conditions, but as the climate changes, these will need to be adjusted. Adaptations to higher temperatures include changing plant material (e.g., rootstocks, cultivars and clones) and modifying viticultural techniques (e.g., changing trunk height, leaf area to fruit weight ratio, timing of pruning) such that harvest dates are maintained in the optimal period at the end of September or early October in the Northern Hemisphere. Vineyards can be made more resilient to drought by planting drought resistant plant material, modifying training systems (e.g., goblet bush vines, or trellised vineyards at wider row spacing), or selecting soils with greater soil water holding capacity. While most vineyards in Europe are currently dry-farmed, irrigation may also be an option to grow sustainable yields under increasingly dry conditions but consideration must be given to associated impacts on water resources and the environment.
Highlights
Like other agricultural crops, grape growing is impacted by environmental conditions, such as soil and climate [1]
Temperature changes associated with climate change are not homogeneous around the globe
Climate change will expose vines to increased drought, either because of reduced rainfall, or because of higher reference evapotranspiration due to elevated temperatures. This may lead to lower yields, because several yield parameters are impacted by water deficits, in particular berry size [14,15] and bud fertility [57]
Summary
Grape growing is impacted by environmental conditions, such as soil and climate [1]. The impact of climate change on viticulture can be studied by means of crop models which allow predicting the impact of changing temperatures, water availability, and ambient CO2 levels on yield components and grape composition [34,35]. These predictions are complex, because all impacting factors interact. Potential adaptations have been studied to help continued production of high quality wines with economically sustainable yields under changing climatic conditions, which is the main focus of this review
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