GIGO: words unreadable aloud

Global Weather Bizarreness and the WINE industry!

NOW it's time to worry!!!

A couple of weeks ago, I read an SLO Tribune article about global climate chaos in general. The alarming part was when it noted the likelihood of unpredictable effects on the wine industry! Though the preview shown below doesn't include it, the article mentioned Greg Jones of Southern Oregon University in Ashland. He's been writing about this subject for years; see for example this (PDF) article published last July/August in the (Australian) Wine Industry Journal.

Anyway, there was a smattering of articles from this past month, as well as a flurry from this past summer. Guess it's time to buy some backcountry land in Washington or British Columbia or something.

SLO Tribune
January 14, 2007 - A1 A-Section
HOW GLOBAL WARMING WILL HURT SLO COUNTY
THE NUMBERS ARE STUNNING: During this century, the snow pack in the Sierra Nevada could shrink by 80 percent. Sea levels could be 3 feet higher and the risk of large wildfires in the state could increase by 55 percent. These are just a few ofmyriad problems scientists say Californians will face in the coming decades because of global warming. All of them will affect San Luis Obispo County, with some hitting the Central Coast particularly hard. Rising sea levels will have the greatest effect...
Contra Costa Times, 2X January 2007
Climate change could crush wine industry (By Betsy Mason):
By any measure, California wines rank among the best in the world. But a 2-degree rise in temperature could make Napa Valley chardonnay a thing of the past. A couple more degrees and Napa would no longer be prime territory for wine of any kind. And warmer grape growing regions such as the Livermore valley could be knocked out of the premium wine game entirely.
MSNBC, 11 July 2006 Warming sours Calif. wineries
Warming seen wiping out Calif. wine industry
Study says area for grapes could fall by up to 81 percent by 2100
WASHINGTON - Climate warming could spell disaster for much of the multibillion-dollar U.S. wine industry. Areas suitable for growing premium wine grapes could be reduced by 50 percent -- and possibly as much as 81 percent -- by the end of this century, according to a study Monday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The paper indicates increasing weather problems for grapes in such areas as California's Napa and Sonoma valleys.
The effects are global:
Climate change forcing migration north: Torres
June 1, 2006
(by Panos Kakaviatos)

Increasingly hostile conditions associated with climate change are forcing vintners to head north, according to an internal memo from one of Spain's largest wine producers. Heat and drought have prompted an 'immediate change' in the Torres wine company of northeast Spain -- specifically the search for land in the cooler regions to the north.
And an SF Chronicle article from last July: (Tuesday, July 11, 2006):
Now's the time to cellar wine
"Scientists fear that rising temperatures due to global warming will harm the wine industry in Napa, Sonoma and Santa Barbara counties ... ... and that by the end of the century, the best growing lands in the state's $2.9 bi"
[Yep, in the sfgate archives, the sub-head cuts off in mid-word like that.]
Jane Kay, Chronicle Environment Writer
Americans may have another reason to worry about global warming: Apart from the rising seas and disappearing polar bears, climate change could also wipe out premium wine grape growing in Napa, Sonoma and Santa Barbara counties by the end of the century, according to a new study out today.

11:43:48 PM comment/