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Have you noticed recently how wine has been tasting a lot better? If you have, well we might actually have a scientific reason for that: climate change. Yes, the thing that we’ve been told is all doom and gloom may actually offer a positive outcome.
The world’s leading wine-producing region is experiencing the benefits of climate change, according to a new study from Oxford University. This study found that warmer summers and wetter winters are resulting in higher quality vintages for Bordeaux wines.
The team suggests that as global temperatures continue to rise, so will the quality of wines – up until the point at which water availability becomes limited.
It seems like doom and gloom surrounds climate change these days, but there is one area where it could be having a positive impact: wine. A 50-year analysis of wine scores from Bordeaux revealed that increasingly warm summers and wetter winters have had an overall positive effect on the quality of the region’s wines.
According to lead author Andrew Wood, people generally prefer more intense flavor profiles with higher sweetness and lower acidity; this is exactly what they found when comparing weather patterns to vintage scores over time.
Although it’s too early to celebrate just yet, it appears as though winemakers may benefit from rising temperatures due to climate change in the future. While researching their findings, the team noticed that weather patterns throughout all seasons impacted wine quality – not just during the growing season as previously thought.
In general, cooler winters and warmer springs combined with hot dry summers and cool dry autumns resulted in high-quality vintages for Bordeaux wines.
Now that their research has been conducted in this region specifically, they are hoping to replicate their study in other areas around the globe to determine if similar results can be seen there too.
