Integration of wine cultivation history for characterizing the terroirs of Côte d’Or (Burgundy, France)

Context and purpose of the study. Red Blotch disease, an affliction caused by the Grapevine red blotch-associated virus (GRBaV), represents a formidable challenge for grape growers and winemakers in prominent viticultural regions around the world.

Climate change impacts regional and local climates, which in turn affects the world’s wine regions. In the short term, these modifications rises issues about maintaining quality and style of wine, and in a longer term about the suitability of grape varieties and the sustainability of traditional wine regions. Thus, adaptation to climate change represents a major challenge for viticulture. In this context, island and coastal vineyards could become coveted areas due to their specific climatic conditions. In regions subject to warming, the proximity of the sea can moderate extremes temperatures, which could be an advantage for wine. However, coastal and island areas are particular prized spaces and subject to multiple pressures that make the establishment or extension of viticulture complex.
In this perspective, it seems relevant to assess the potentialities of coastal and island areas for viticulture. This contribution will present a spatial optimization model that tends to characterize most suitable agroclimatic patterns in historical or emerging vineyards according to different scenarios. Thanks to an in-depth bibliography a global inventory of coastal and insular vineyards on a worldwide scale has been realized. Relevant criteria have been identified to describe the specificities of these vineyards. They are used as input data in the optimization process, which will optimize some objectives and spatial aspects. According to a predefined scenario, the objectives are set in three main categories associated with climatic characteristics, vineyards characteristics and management strategies. At the end of this optimization process, a series of maps presents the different spatial configurations that maximize the scenario objectives.

In this video recording of the IVES science meeting 2024, Luca Brillante (California State University, Fresno, USA) speaks about vineyard management, advanced sensing and data analytics. This presentation is based on an original article accessible for free on OENO One.

Climate change critically challenges viticulture. Among other threats, extreme and increasingly frequent heatwaves cause irreversible burns on leaves and bunches. A series of observations and experiments was conducted to better understand how leaf burns originate and whether genetics or management practices can mitigate them. In 2019, a panel of 279 potted cultivars of Vitis vinifera L. grown outdoors suffered a heat peak and a genetic origin of leaf burn variability was demonstrated. To deeper explore this variability, fourteen cultivars were selected for their contrasting responses to high temperatures, and detached leaves were submitted to a controlled increase in temperature up to 50 °C in a growth chamber.

Rhineland-Palatinate is Germany’s largest wine growing region. The recently launched collaborative project in the frame of the ‘Carl-Zeiss-Stiftungs-Kooperationsfonds für Nachhaltigkeitsforschung’ focusses on the risk-benefit assessment of the use of grape pomace (GP) from the region ‘Pfalz’ in Rhineland-Palatinate as a natural fertilizer