Climate change not responsible for rising alcohol levels: study

can any one explain me in simple terms that why with increase in temperature the level of wine rises ans visa versa.

@Joseph Filippi: "I can always add back what nature took out, a little water"

In Europe watering the wine is forbidden as it is considered a commercial fraud

I copied this passage to point out the mistake in context.
"The study also found discrepancies between alcohol content stated on labels and actual content in bottle. In 57% of the 100,000 samples the alcohol level was understated with the worst offending being New World red wine, which averaged 0.45 percentage points below the stated level."

This is all well and good to talk about, but I find the final consumer has the biggest say with their purchases.

Please note that the paper cited in this research is a 'working paper' ... yet it has been cited as peer-reviewed when in fact it is not. So the media picks up on it and it becomes fact!

As for the article, overall I think it is a good piece of work that examines a large amount of wine data, however the treatment of climate in the study is marginal at best and would not likely make it through a thorough peer-review process. Furthermore, after saying that climate does not have an affect, then at the end of the article the authors say that they could have the climate piece wrong, well of course they do ... but their statements have already said that climate does not! I think that they make an unsubstantiated statement that changes in climate have virtually nothing to do with changes in fruit and wine composition and of course alcohol. There are numerous peer-reviewed viticulture, enology, and climate papers that do a much more thorough treatment of the data and analysis that show that climate has a role in these fruit and wine trends. The authors use questionable climate data, likely the wrong climate parameters, and a time period that is insufficient to examine a climate structure and trend! While no one would ever say that changing climates are solely responsible for changes in alcohol, what most people don't get is that without the warmer climates of today growers/producers couldn't do the hang time that they now do ... it was basically impossible to do it 30-60 years ago! So while climates are changing at one rate, and alcohol is changing at another due to many mechanisms, what is being lost is that climate allows it to all happen.

Robert Parker has been one, if not, the most influential Wine Critic in at least the last 15 years, or since the Europeans began to recognize him. It is very clear that Robert Parker favours, full bodied wines, with heavy fruit, dark chocolate, coffee and spices. Many wine producers have adapted their wines to Robert Parker's taste and wines like that need alcohol, otherwise they would be very astringent and unpleasant without the extra alcohol.

I'd love to see the references as to who the great volume of winemakers are who have made the claim this study is now refuting! Surely most wine makers have been saying better hygiene and improved viticultiral practices allied to a warming climate have resulted in higher alcohol levels. It's not just a simple case of warmer equals higher alcohols. Indeed most are now claiming that they can begin to use this same (and new) understanding of theri vineyards, and their environment, to bring alcohol levels back down again. This study seems to have looked at an awful lot of wine to prove very little!

On a more practical point: if over 50% of all wines are understating alcohol levels and many of these are doing so below the tax bands in force then the authorities (in Ireland) are entitled to levy a retrospective excise tax on the importers. Now that would be good story to get stuck into - it might even pay for all of the bottles used in this study in the first place.

What about green harvest? Because wine writers often give high ratings to concentrated wines, more and more vine growers are cutting sane grapes in the summer, just to concentrate the rest. Unfortunately they not always keep in mind this method will give a boost to the sugar level of the left grapes. So they have to harvest weeks earlier while tannins are still unripe and green. They try to mask it with residual sugar. As published in Meiningers, 12 to 20 gram is very much appreciated by young consumers…. More residual sugar can be equal with one percent lower alcohol! Winemakers better train their vines in spring so the polyphenolic tannic acid can reach an acceptable level at the time sugar level is high enough. This will result in mature grapes, ready to pick, not needing a lot of intervention in the cellar.. No climate change but mental change!

Ya know these so called journalists will write about anything that will get them their $40.00 for the article. As a winemaker if I want the grape to be harvested later to get the flavors I want, I can do that. If I feel the higher alcohol makes the wine better I'll leave it alone. I can always add back what nature took out, a little water. There is nothing wrong with that just as their is nothing wrong with a writer trying to make a living. Their judgement is merely another different assessment. The customer is the ultimate deciding factor plain and simple. As these writers depict a trend as right or wrong makes no difference to anyone except themselves. They themselves are a dime a dozen just as they feel our wines are. If you like it drink it, it's as simple as that.

US Federal law says if the wine is 14% it pays the higher tax NOT 14.1. That's why there are so many wines at "13.9%."

Julian Alston has hit the nail squarely on the head. The mere notion that someone needed a 'study' to refute climate change claims from some winemakers is hilarious! Are we really that gullable?