Wines of the week according to Decanter

RED WINE of the week

Clos de los Siete, Mendoza, Argentina 2008 Part of Michel Rolland's sizeable, globe-spanning portfolio, this - a blend of Malbec, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah and a drop of Petit Verdot - manages to balance freshness with intensity. There's a delightful bramble pie character running through it, partnered by other hedgerow fruits, chocolate and floral highlights. (16 points) £11.99 Harrods, London SW1 (020 7730 1234), Majestic Wine Warehouses (01923 298 200), Waitrose supermarkets (0800 188 884)

WHITE WINE of the week

Penfolds, Koonunga Hill, Autumn Riesling, South Australia 2008 Carrying a dash of Traminer, this is packaged in a fetching retro style and, as you may expect, has plenty of purity and definition. A mingling of flowers, minerals and grapefruit with a sherbet edge, this is dry and zesty with cracking balance and freshness. (16 points) £8.99 Waitrose supermarkets (0800 188 884)

How Low Can They Go? Oregon Wineries Tackle Carbon Reduction

A group of 14 wineries completes a challenge to measure, minimize and offset their greenhouse gases

Dana Nigro
Posted: April 27, 2010

What would happen if Oregon became too warm to consistently produce high-quality Pinot Noir, the notoriously sensitive grape behind its signature wine? A group of wineries and growers concerned about the effects of climate change have banded together to try to reduce their environmental impact. Now, nearly three years after they started, 14 of them—representing about 20 percent of the state's wine production—have completed the Carbon Neutral Challenge, a project to measure and cut greenhouse gases emitted by farming vineyards, producing wines and selling them globally.
More than a dozen other wineries around the world, including Parducci and Rodney Strong in California, already claim to have achieved carbon neutrality, reducing the amount of greenhouse gases they produce and then balancing out the remainder with offsets. But this is the largest group of U.S. wineries to go through a voluntary program together to reduce their carbon footprint.
"A lot of Oregon's wineries were motivated to look at what they can do to be part of the solution," said Andrea Durbin, executive director of the Oregon Environmental Council, which has partnered with the Oregon Wine Board on the Carbon Neutral Challenge program since 2007. "The wine industry sees themselves as the canary in the coal mine."
"As a whole, the wine industry may not be the biggest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, but we're really impacted by climate change," said Alison Sokol Blosser of Sokol Blosser, one of the 14 who completed the program. "As the heat units rise, we're going to start seeing more concentration in the wines, we're going to see higher alcohol wines, and then we may also start to see other varietals being planted that are going to grow in warmer climates."
The 14 that have completed the challenge are Abacela, Adelsheim, A to Z Wineworks/Rex Hill, Chehalem Winery, Cooper Mountain Wine, King Estate, Left Coast Cellars, Lemelson Vineyards, Mahonia Vineyards and Nursery, Sokol Blosser Winery, Soter Vineyards, Stoller Vineyards, Willamette Valley Vineyards and Winderlea Wine Company.
Another dozen or so are still working their way through the program, continuing to figure out how to measure and reduce their emissions. Durbin explained that some smaller wineries ran into hurdles because they did not have the organization or staff to collect all the data. And in the current economy, the cost of the program was also a factor; some could not make needed investments to reduce emissions or support the offsets.
In the challenge's first step, participating wineries and vineyards assess their greenhouse gas emissions, both direct emissions, such as those produced by company vehicles, and indirect, such as those made while generating electricity the wineries purchase. They did so using a carbon inventory tool developed for the wine business by Ecos Consulting, based on international standards supported by the Climate Registry, a national system for public reporting of emissions. All of the participating wineries and vineyards became members of the Climate Registry, and six of them had their emissions verified by an auditor, at a cost of $2,500 per winery.
"When doing this type of greenhouse-gas reporting, it takes two to three years to get an accurate picture of the emissions," says Mat Elmore, program associate for the Carbon Neutral Challenge. He noted that the wineries had a steep learning curve, but as they went through the process, it became quicker and more accurate.
In the second step, wineries and growers work on reducing their emissions and saving on purchased energy. Among the changes they've made are using goats or sheep to mow the grass in the vineyards, installing renewable energy sources such as solar power, and introducing more energy-efficient lighting and cooling systems that can also help save them money.

winebusiness.com

Norton lanza al mercado un Grûner Veltliner

La cepa, típica del Sur de Austria, se adaptó bien a la finca que la bodega tiene en Las Compuertas. Hace cuatro años, el dueño de la bodega argentina, de origen austríaco, trajo la cepa típica de su país para probar la adaptación al clima y suelo argentinos. Se plantaron unas cuantas hectáreas para elaborar alrededor de 50 mil litros de este varietal blanco seco, no aromático, con marcada acidez y frescura y tonalidades verde-amarillas pálidas. Ahora el vino está en proceso de elaboracion y saldrá al mercado este año.

Twitter Founder Biz Stone

Social network pioneer explains his charity wine project in more than 140 characters
Jennifer Fiedler
Posted: March 30, 2010

Biz Stone, 36, is the cofounder of Twitter, the social networking site turned cultural phenomenon that allows people to broadcast their thoughts on the web in pintsize slices of 140 characters or less. Stone created the microblogging site with partner Evan Williams after stints at Odeo (a podcasting site), Xanga (a platform for bloggers), and Google. Twitter’s swift rise from geeky obscurity to household name has earned Stone such accolades as GQ’s "Nerd of the Year" and Inc. magazine’s “Entrepreneur of the Decade,” as well as inclusion on Time’s list of the most influential people of 2009.

Last year, Stone and Williams announced an unusual side project for Twitter: winemaking. Using a custom-crush facility, Twitter is making a California Chardonnay and a Pinot Noir under the Fledgling wine label and donating the proceeds from the sales to Room to Read, a non-profit organization that supports literacy programs around the world. Of course, interested parties can follow the progress of the entire project, from pictures of Twitter employees harvesting the grapes to videos about malolactic fermentation, on the wine’s own Twitter page (it currently has more than 300,000 followers). Stone recently spoke with Wine Spectator about how Twitter ended up in the wine market, what’s in his personal wine fridge and why Twitter is like winemaking.

Wine Spectator: How did the idea for Fledgling come about?
Biz Stone: We really admire [Room to Read] and we thought it was a great fit. People need to learn how to read so they can Tweet. And, in our organization, there are people that are wine enthusiasts. We had heard through one of our advisors about a local company called Crushpad that allowed you to make your own wine. Everything came together one day as we were talking. We would make wine and it would be fun because it was something that everyone could participate in together and all the proceeds would go to Room to Read.

WS: How involved were you in the making of it?
BS: I’m mostly involved from the standpoint of putting together the right people, coming up with the name, the idea and the branding. I unfortunately haven’t been able to make it to the fun part—the harvest and where we actually got to do the crushing [of the grapes]. I will definitely make it a point to be at the tasting.

WS: Are you into wine?
BS: Since I moved to Northern California, I have to be because wine sort of runs from the taps here. My wife and I are members of a sparkling wine club at Gloria Ferrer vineyards. We get involved, not just in tasting wine but going to the Catalan festival they have every year. There’s so much more to it than the wine itself. It’s been meaningful for me because one of the things that we’re constantly striving for at Twitter is this sense of craftsmanship—that you own what you’re working on and you’re proud of it. That’s something that really comes through in winemaking.

WS: Do you have a wine collection?
BS: We do have a wine fridge now, which has been a step up. Ev, my cofounder, has a pretty good start on a collection. When he got married he asked everyone as a gift to only bring a bottle of their favorite wine. We brought him wine from Duckhorn Vineyards. It’s a place we stopped at when we got married and we really loved the wine there.

WS: What else is in your wine fridge?
BS: Even though I didn’t initially like it, I’ve really started liking Chardonnay. There’s one that they sell at Trader Joe's, La Crema. I really like that one. … I’m more familiar with California wines. We try to buy local wines whenever possible.

WS: How does being a vegan affect the wines you choose or food you pair with it?
BS: You can find wines that are not filtered through isinglass [or egg whites]. One of our board members recently had us over for dinner and selected wines that were all vegan. That was thoughtful … We’ve been to Spain a bunch of times. We have a lot of fun getting tapas in a veggie format. This past New Year’s Eve, we decided to stay home because I’d done so much traveling. We made a bunch of tapas and drank cava.

WS: Are there other regions that you’ve been to?
BS: We were surprised by the Finger Lakes region of New York. We went up there to visit Farm Sanctuary, where farm animals that are hurt and would otherwise be killed get to go live out their lives. And it turns out that they have all this great white wine.

WS: Would you ever own your own vineyard?
BS: I think it would be amazing. I don’t think I’d want to do the work, but [vineyards are] so beautiful. I always find it amazing that you can go to a vineyard and for $5 or $10 you can just sit at a beautiful table out under a tree and try all their wine. It doesn’t seem fair—It seems like it should cost more than that. But it’s such a great thing to do. Twenty minutes from my house and we’re sitting under a big tree in Napa, drinking wine.

WS: Do you have plans to do other wine charity projects?
BS: If it works out, then definitely. This is the new ambition: Finding a way to do good while having fun and making a profit. It helps us. It builds our brand. It builds culture. But it’s also meaningful in the world.

Wine Spectator

Reports of winery flops are overblown

San Francisco Business Times - by Chris Rauber

Despite reports that a wave of foreclosures may hit Napa Valley’s wineries and vineyards, there are signs that rumors of Napa’s illness have been exaggerated.
“We have not received calls from folks desperate to sell their wineries,” said Eileen Fredrikson, of Woodside’s Gomberg, Fredrikson & Associates wine industry consulting firm, referring to recent media reports that a number of Napa foreclosures may be in the offing. “As with any industry, there is no one-size-fits-all story.”
That’s not to say there won’t be any foreclosures or forced sales, but that the big picture appears to be improving, at least incrementally.
In fact, foreclosure fears may have hit just as things are starting to look up for the hard-pressed high-end wine business. The San Francisco-based Wine Institute, which represents 1,000 or so California wineries, reported last week that fourth-quarter wine exports were up nearly 16 percent compared with a year earlier, possibly a sign the worst is over. Overall, U.S. wine exports dropped 9.5 percent last year.
But the year-end 2009 rebound gives California vintners, many of them in the greater Bay Area, “reason to believe that 2010 will be a good year,” said Wine Institute CEO Bobby Koch — or at least a stronger one than last year, which saw many wines that retail for more than $20 take a beating.
“We see early signs that the winery M&A market will begin a slow and gradual recovery this year, driven by a gradually improving wine market and a recovery of the capital markets,” said Vic Motto, chairman and CEO of Global Wine Partners, a St. Helena-based wine investment bank.
Although hard data is in short supply, Motto points to an early February Nielsen Co. report showing that off-premise wine sales increased 5.1 percent for the month ending Feb. 6, and 3.5 percent over the prior 13 weeks. The vast majority of that growth came from domestic wines, and wines priced from $9 to $20 or more contributed significantly to the improved figures.
And although Silicon Valley Bank warned of possibly as many as 10 foreclosures or forced winery or vineyard sales in Napa Valley this year and next, Motto notes that there haven’t been any significant winery transactions yet this year, “because wineries thinking of selling are waiting for a stronger seller’s market.”
The recession’s gnarly impact on higher-end wine sales, resulting in many consumers’ trading down to lower-cost alternatives, has had an impact on many high-end Napa wineries, Motto acknowledged, but he maintains that the wineries that are in serious trouble were headed that way before the recession hit.
Even so, even the optimists admit that the early budlike signs of a stronger high-end wine market are just that.

San Francisco Business Times

De Sudáfrica, lo mejor

Con un espumante, un Pinotage, un Sauvignon Blanc-Semillón, un Chenín Blanc, un blend entre Grenache, Syrah, Viognier y Cinsault, un Syrah y un Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve, Marie Weaver, consultora de Wines of South Africa (WOSA) trajo a Argentina algunos de los mejores exponentes del vino de ese país. La cita fue en el Hotel Park Hyatt, con el apoyo de la embajada de Sudáfrica Argentina y Simposium.

Sudáfrica es el noveno productor de vino del mundo: con 101.325 mil hectáreas cultivadas -contra las 220 mil de Argentina- mostró entre 2003 y 2008 un crecimiento del 79%, duplicando sus exportaciones en esos cinco años. En tanto, en valor por ventas en mercado interno, creció 76% en el período analizado. Este año, la cosecha de ese país tuvo una baja importante. Se produjeron 960 millones de litros, frente a los 1.130 producidos el año anterior.

La mayor producción de Sudáfrica es la de Chenín Blanc, que representa el 20% de la producción y el 30% de las blancas. Un vino propio de ese país es el Pinotage, que se logró a partir de la unión entre dos uvas, Pinot Noir y Cinsault en 1925 y que se empezó a embotellar y comercializar en los años 60. La producción de blancos se lleva el 56% del total en Sudáfrica.

El país tenía muchos viñedos antiguos de Chenín, pero muchos de ellos fueron arrancados durante los años 60. Hoy, el 40% de los viñedos tienen entre 4 y 10 años de antigüedad y una porción pequeña, 17,7% de más de 20 años.

Su suelo es uno de los más antiguos del mundo, compuesto por granito y piedra arenosa, con una de las floras más diversas del planeta: más de 10.000 especies conviven allí.

Su clima, a diferencia del de Argentina, es mediterráneo y llueve durante el invierno.

En tanto, las zonas vitivinícolas de mayor relevancia son Constantia, Stellenbosch
-donde se encuentra la famosa universidad-, Paarl y Franschhoek. También hay zonas redescubiertas, como Elim, Elgin, Swartland, Tullbach, Darling, Robertson, Walker Bay y Wellington entre otras y Elgin, donde se extienden los nuevos cultivos.

En Sudáfrica hay más de 3.800 productores de uva y 585 bodegas. La industria del vino contribuye más de un 2% al PBI de ese país y una gran fuente de empleo, sobre todo para personas marginales, sobre todo personas de color, mediante programas que invierten en su capacitación para incorporarlos al mundo del trabajo del vino.

Como en Argentina, un estudio realizado por SA Wine Industry Information & Systems (SAWIS) indica que el sector vitivinícola en Sudáfrica ha estado sometido a una escalada de impuestos (que crecieron 71% desde 2003) y sufre una sostenida presión inflacionaria.