Anthropogenic intervention in shaping Terroir in a California Pinot noir vineyard

In the context of sustainable viticulture that implements organic practices to maintain soil fertility, green manuring plays a crucial role due to its ability to stock carbon and nitrogen in soil while supporting biodiversity.

The color of a red wine is one of the most important parameters of its quality, giving much information on its status, such as the grape variety used or the winemaking style. As the result of a complex equilibrium between different forms of anthocyanins and polymerization reactions which occur over the course of time, color can also serve as an indication of a wines’ age. For this purpose the “chemical age” i and ii indexes have been introduced by Somers in 1977. The chemical age index i measures the color absorbance after the addition of acetaldehyde while chemical index ii provides an indication of how much of the total red pigments are resistant to SO2 bleaching.

Wine quality depends on grape biochemical constituents, including sugars, organic acids, amino acids, and bound and free aroma compounds, which are influenced by vineyard location and environmental factors such as temperature and precipitation [1].

Annually, around 31.95 million tonnes of grapevine prunings are produced worldwide as agricultural waste.

Row orientation is a critical long-term viticulture practice, which may have a determining effect on grape and wine quality as well as cost efficiency on a specific terroir selected for cultivation.