Observation and modeling of climate at fine scales in wine-producing areas

The study aims to address the issue of resilience to climate change in viticulture through the adoption of the expert knowledge elicitation (EKE) approach.

Dealcoholised beverages are trendy. But this market segment is slowed down by flavour losses during dealcoholisation and by the reduced perception of flavours in the absence of alcohol.

Sun exposure is needed for balanced grape ripening and sugar accumulation but is also one of the main drivers for a premature Riesling ageing

Row orientation and canopy management are essential for high quality grapevine production. Microclimatic conditions of the leaves and fruits can be influenced by the canopy geometry. Remote sensing is a very promising tool to describe vegetative growth and physiological behavior of vineyards. However, the correlation between remotely sensed data and in situ field measurements has been described scarcely in the scientific literature so far. The aim of the study was to correlate remotely sensed data obtained with Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) with in situ field measurements to describe canopy structure.

Excessive fertilization of the vineyard leads to low quality grapes, increased costs and a negative impact on the environment. In order to establish an integrated management system aimed at a sustainable fertilization of the vineyards, nutritional reference levels were established. For this purpose, 30 representative vineyards of the Albariño variety were studied, in which soil and petiole analyses were carried out for two years and grape yield and quality at harvest were measured. In both years of study, soil pH, calcium, sodium and cation exchange capacity were positively correlated with calcium content and negatively correlated with manganese in grapes. Irrigated vineyards had higher levels of aluminium in soil and lower levels of calcium in petiole. Climatic conditions were very different in the years of the study. The year 2019 was colder than usual, in 2020 there was a marked water stress with high summer temperatures. This resulted in medium-high acidity in grapes in 2019 and low acidity in 2020, with sugar levels being similar both years. A very marked decrease in must amino nitrogen was observed in 2020, with ammonia nitrogen remaining stable. The correlation of acidity and sugar values in grapes with soil and petiole analysis data made it possible to establish reference levels for the nutritional diagnosis of the Albariño variety in this region. Based on these results, an easy-to-use TIC application is currently being created for grapegrowers, aimed at improving the sustainability of the vineyard through reasoned fertilization. This study has now been extended to other Galician vine varieties.