Hmmm, maybe there’s something to that “Wines grown in England during the Medieval Warm Period” after all. I think maybe the French are upset that Scottish wine might be served with kippers rather than truffles. Oh the horror!
From the UK Telegraph:
Best wines will come from Scotland if climate change is not stopped, French chefs say
Prominent French chefs have given warning that the country’s wines will lose their complexity and the best produce will come from Scotland if the effects of climate change are not tackled.
excerpts:
President Nicolas Sarkozy was posed a stark choice: save French wine by clinching a deal at the international climate conference in Copenhagen in December, or see generations of viticulture slowly die out as vineyards cross the Channel and head north.
“As flagships of our common cultural heritage, elegant and refined, French wines are today in danger,” 50 leading names from the world of French wine and food wrote in an open letter. “Marked by higher alcohol levels, over-sunned aromatic ranges and denser textures, our wines could lose their unique soul.”
Among the signatories were Marc Veyrat, a chef with three Michelin stars, Mauro Colagreco, the award-winning chef, and Franck Thomas, who was voted the best sommelier in the world. The message was also supported by a host of domains from Champagne to Languedoc-Roussillon.
Climate change has been blamed for degrading French vineyards, with heatwaves, giant summer hailstorms in Bordeaux and new plant diseases.
The signatories said that if global temperatures rose by more than two per cent before the end of the century, “our soil will not survive” and “wine will travel 1,000 kilometres beyond its traditional limits”.
I could handle a Siberian Burgandy. These are red herrings. Rose Herrings.
Before it was the English wines that stole the French show. Why do you think all those London streets are named after wine related things.
Oh wait, does that mean London was once warmer? Why yes, I do believe that is what it means. hmmm.
But if it we me, I would bet the warm will go south, not north.
Zut alors! Oh ze – ‘ow you Eenglish say’ – ze trajedee!
Being Scottish – and who in future may sit down to breakfast with a fine wee beaujolais Auchtermuchty to wash down my kippers, I say bring on global warming!
But, seriously, I’ve never been a wine man. I’m a beer or a ‘single malt’ man.
If even one AGW’er sites this as an authority on global warming, the nonsense about peer-reviewed tomes should die a quick and thankful death.
Of course, even if France adopts the climate change initiatives that are being pushed, they will still lose their vineyards, as well as wrecking their economy. And I have to wonder… we grow wine grapes here in Calif, in areas that are much warmer than the vineyards in France… and Calif wines (much to the annoyance of the French) can be very, very good.
They would do better to begin experimenting with grape vines that acclimate to warmer temps, instead of trying to fight the inevitable. Climate *changes*, it just does. It will get warmer, then it will get colder, as it has throughout history. They should hang drawings of the Ice Festivals on the Thames in their offices, to remind them of the time when it was a bit cooler.
Save the alcohol!!
The French also tried legislating the exclusion of foreign words (eg, le weekend, le hamburger) to keep their language pure.
Didn’t work.
I thought it would be hard to find anyone less able than a musician or actor to give an informed opinion on global warming (or “climate change”, if you prefer). I had forgotten about celebrity chefs (and couturiers, parfumiers, florists, hairdressers, chiropodists, and dog-washers).
It’s really good if wine is grown in Scotland, beause it will taste the same or better, have more alcohol and be cheaper!
Did they mean:
‘The signatories said that if global temperatures rose by more than two per cent before the end of the century’
or maybe 2 degree C?
Since when were chefs, even excellent French chefs, in a position to know what the climate is going to do?
Perhaps this is yet another in the long line of rather pathetic attempts by AGW promoters to tell misleading stories?
Oh, our wine won’t taste right. Our cheese won’t be as stinky. Our waiters won’t be as rude.
add it to the ever growing list of things to blame on global warming
What a bunch of CR-P!!
French “Cap and Trade” regulations must have depleted enough CO2 to affect their grape growth.
WA, CA and BC grapes produce better wines anyway.
IMHO!!!
FYI
Wine Grapes are still grown in the City of Lincoln UK, (Coordinates: 53°13′N 0°32′W) and have been since Norman times The landscape of the nearby Wolds is already being surveyed by Champagne growers as potential new sites
This is a crock. England has grown vineyards for 2,000 years. Even some streets in the far north are called Vine Street. Where I live there have been vineyards for many years – yet England’s temperature has gone up just half a degree. And that’s if the Met Office have given a proper job to adjusting its Central England Temperature for the Urban Island Heat Effect. If they haven’t (and no one here trusts the Met Office anymore) then the temp hasn’t gone up at all!
DERise (09:24:13) said:
Oh, our wine won’t taste right. Our cheese won’t be as stinky. Our waiters won’t be as rude.
That last bit is emphatically NOT related to climate.
Genetics (“nature”) perhaps, or up-bringing (“nuture”) maybe, or perhaps there’s just something in the water which completely neutralizes testosterone.
It should be noted that the bad reputation of “the French” actually appears to derive from the ridiculous behavior of Parisians. The good news is that rest of France seems to dislike Parisians as much as everybody else. Analogous to the reputation of New Yorkers in say Cut-and-Shoot, Texas.
I have actually had older folks in the Midi (where the “french resistance” actually put up a pretty good fight; apparently better water) who, upon learning I was American, offered to buy me a drink. In Paris, that news would start Une Greve; to the Barricades! Bloody idiots.
It’s no good, I’ve checked the diary, checked the calendar, rung my friends, it’s definitely not 1st April, so it must be true!
Really this is an absolute howler! BTW, my vine in Devon is doing ok, but for some reason the last 2-3 years the crop just hasn’t had enough sunshine to bring the grapes to fullness -they’re not brilliant by any means but they taste good but don’t truly ripen until late October! The wine isn’t bad either – my wife says otherwise – anyway after 3 glasses the tv goes fuzzy & I can actually understand what the groovy hip person on there is saying! Seriously though anyone can grow grapes in the UK. A good technique is to build a conservatory on the back of the house assuming you’re generally southish facing, plant the vine outside so that the roots are exposed to the soil & rain water, & feed the stem into the conservatory & hang it on a wire frame. This way you get the best of both worlds!
The Romans had a fort near my home town at Fortingall just north of Loch Tay in Scotland – latitude 56 deg 36 min North. (Pontius Pilate was born there apparently.) I don’t know if they grew grapes there. I can’t think of any grape related geographical names in the area off the top of my head but I’ll put it on the back burner overnight. Interestingly, also at Fortingall, there is the ‘Fortingall Yew’. This tree is said to be over 3000 years old and I bet it has a few climatic stories to tell…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fortingall_Yew
tarpon (08:55:43) : English wines
Study the history of England, France, Spain, and Portugal [kings, queens, marriages, treaties (Treaty of Methuen – 1703) ] and so on if you want to know about London’s lock on the wine trade. It has nothing to do with the grapes and wine that was grown there.
Our chefs have degrees in cuisine and in climato-astrology. They can cook like they can predict the (negative, of course) effect of climate change in 2100, on wine, cheese, truffe and puree de pomme de terre.
Alan the Brit (09:50:07) :
“Seriously though anyone can grow grapes in the UK. A good technique is to build a conservatory on the back of the house …”
Absolutely! The greenhouse effect!
… and for this we should destroy our economy for all time …
Looking forward to Greenland whisky ……
Jimmy Haigh (09:51:31) Does that make Pontius Pilate, “Just a Roman in the Gloamin’ by the bonnie banks of Clyde?
Sorry, couldn’t resist…
“Prominent French chefs….”
well i knew the UN, national government’s, most major scientific organisations and respected universities were saying this but i remain a sceptic but if prominent french chefs are saying this then i might just have to reconsider my position.
“more than two per cent before the end of the century”
well i was going to work out what 2% on the kelvin scale was but i could not bother get up to get my calculator to ridicule such a stupid statement.
Funny how if its 20c one day and 10c the next people say the temperature is half.
The vikings named Newfoundland “Vinland” (wineland) 1000 years ago, guess why?
Joanie (09:09:50):-
This Brit prefers Californian wine to French already!
Sarkozy’s an unlettered idiot when it comes to wine; French wines are unique because of the minerality of the soils, as in Germany. In California, most wines have low mineral content and are vinified flabby and overly alcoholic because of high sugar levels due to the warm climate.
The only thing on this planet that ISN’T threatened by “climate change” is Al Gore’s bank balance.
If we are lucky, maybe we can enjoy Sudanese/Algerian/Chadian wine during the next LIA.
“Marked by higher alcohol levels, over-sunned aromatic ranges and denser textures, our wines could lose their unique soul.”
They say “higher alcohol levels” like it was a bad thing! 😉
Having taken viticulture and enology while at university, I can state categorically that this is a crock. (Hey, classes where the final exam is a mandatory wine tasting of a dozen styles? What 19 year old kid would pass that up!) 2 C is NOTHING to wine grapes. Their range is far greater than that. From Alaska to Arizona, you can make wine.
But seriously, the only way this thesis could have truth in it is if the Italian and Spanish wines were poor, and they are not… (Different, yes, but mostly due to selection of grape varieties and choices in the processing). Just a few years ago these same folks were crying in their Burgundy over the horrible threat to French wines posed by the rapid rise of low cost, and excellent quality, Italian and Spanish wines. Can’t have it both ways, guys.
And yes, California produces some great wines. We’ve won “blind taste tests” in France with French judges. Reliably. And that’s the point I’d push most. California has very reliable weather as compared to France. Every year is a vintage year. France has much more variable weather, so you must know your years.
So exactly how is it that an industry that has survived a few hundreds (maybe even a couple of thousand…) years, including a couple of empires coming and going, a LIA, two world wars, and countless other insults; how is it that that industry will collapse in despair because the harvest comes a couple of days earlier in some years?
Yes, that’s right. Due to the higher variability of French weather, all that would happen (even if this nutty AGW thesis were true) is that the years that would have failed due to being too cold would then be “Vintage Years” and in the warmer years, the grapes would reach the proper “degree days” a bit earlier.
To get a significant increase in sugar and significant drop of acids would take a very large temperature change (like the difference between Napa Valley and Modesto – about 85F vs 105F mid summer). For those not familiar with California, Modesto is a major bulk wine making area south and inland from San Francisco in the very hot inland Central Valley. It is where “American Graffiti” was set. It is also dramatically hot in summer.
Yes, at VERY large increases of the 20F magnitude you can get a bit “thin” on the flavor side and a bit higher on the sugar (and so, alcohol). Yet there are some very nice wines made in the Central Valley of a quality, and quantity, that gives the French fits. California viticulture and enology is not defined by Napa.
We spent a fair amount of time covering how to make very good wines with high central valley temperatures (watch your brix closer and harvest faster when you hit “ripe”, for example), since some of the folks would go on to work for the local wineries… The “Ag school” I attended trains most of the vintners in California. We had a full winery, including crushers and brandy still on campus. And 3000 acres of crop land. This was NOT a light weight fluff operation. It’s an industrial scale formal U.C. major. If you want a Ph.D. in wine making, this is where you go in America. I was not “in the major”, but investigated it as an option.
So we have a (roughly) 10C range here with fine wines made at both ends, and they are getting worked up over 2C in a place with more than that year to year variation? The “maths” don’t add up…
I think I smell political posturing…
BTW, it is much harder to make good wine if it gets colder. There are a lot of things you can do to make good wines from early ripened grapes, but not much you can do to fix green hard sour grapes. The German wine makers have already pushed that “style” about as far as it can go. In New Zealand, they make some very nice wines, but their Reds are just not the deep rich flavor you get from Australia. They just don’t have the heat for it. But for making a middle red or a German style white, they are stellar. Move up to Australia, and you can make just about any style. They have the heat for it.
Same story here. California can make anything. Oregon makes fine German style and some “nice” reds, but it’s hard work to make a deep rich red. By the time you reach Canada, well, it’s a lot easier to make a German style white than a Burgundy…
And I guess that’s the 2nd major point I’d make. You CAN make wines, and good ones, all the way from Alaska to Arizona. And that means that 2c is one heck of a joke.
What, you think that’s hyperbole? Think again:
http://www.catchwine.com/wineries/alaska/
http://www.catchwine.com/wineries/arizona/
Mmmm – Antarctica Wine, Nunavut Brandy, Siberian Tequila.
Good find on this, the level of ignorance and arrogance is… well… french.
Sarko’s just trying to keep the British and the US off Balance, with their Nuclear
Power, they can afford to watch US and Britain commit econocide…
The grapes of wrath!! LOL
The Joad family is moving to Scotland while the terrrrrrrrrrible warmth invades France – oh, the delicious irony, it’s all about the flavor…. He he heh ha ha ha hah!
Southern France is havong quite a heat wave for the moment – more than 40 celsius in many places. Spain and Italy are not safe either. In Spain, several places had 30+°C… during the night!
“Prominent French chefs have given warning that the country’s wines will lose their complexity and the best produce will come from Scotland if the effects of climate change are not tackled.”
Finally! It’s about time chefs weigh in on this.
Big flambé have kept them muzzled far too long.
I notice that on your map Chablis seems to have migrated to Provence.
What more proof of climate chaos do you need.
Since the alarmists are always on the lookout for proxies that support the A in AGW, I see an opportunity for a terrific grant proposal here. I propose to amass a collection from the vast stores of collectable vintage wine that exist from the last century or two and analyze them for the effect of CO2 over that time. Given the prices many of these bottles command, the grant will necessarily have to be substantial, but with the billions of dollars flowing around in climate science that shouldn’t really be a hindrance, particularly if I hint, none to subtly, that I expect to confirm a high CO2 sensitivity. Of course, once the bottles are opened for sampling the residual material will have to be given proper biological processing, if you know what I mean, before disposal. Since my own scientific credentials are kind of weak, I’m open to accepting coauthors whose dedication to the spirit of scientific exploration would compel them to invest the commitment in time and potential hangovers in this potentially groundbreaking oenological experiment in climate science.
Jimmy Haigh (08:59:50) :
’single malt’
Save a wee dram for me Jimmy, and Lang may yer lum reek!
D. Cameron King
hehe if only hysterical global warming were true then we could get rid of French snobbery
Jimmy Haigh (10:47:42) :
“If we are lucky, maybe we can enjoy Sudanese/Algerian/Chadian wine during the next LIA.”
I have drunk Ethiopian wine, though ‘enjoyed’ would be an exaggeration.
—
Anyone remember the paper by Isobel Chuine et. al., purporting to predict temperature from grape harvest dates in Burgundy? I think Doug Keenan had something on it.
Her model gave 2003 as the hottest year. Unfortunately the model’s temperature was 2.4C higher than actually measured by Meteo France. Oops!
Maybe chefs could do better.
Flanagan, sounds like Paraguay or Argentina when I was down there a few years back. They make very good wine there, too.
Off topic but, you should be aware than man’s very existence threatens the earth:
Man’s Very Existence Causes Global Warming
Does anyone know how French wines from the incredibly hot summer of 2003 fared? Even if there is there is a 21st-century warming trend of the type that the IPCC predicts, summers will generally not be that warm for a long time. Did the 2003 heat reduce the quality of that year’s wines?
Flanagan (11:18:07),
no reliable Spanish station had a Tmin even close to 30 °C.
Of all the synoptic stations, the maximum value of the nighttime lows was around 25 °C at a couple of sites on the Mediterranean coast.
Look at:
http://www.uni-koeln.de/math-nat-fak/geomet/meteo/winfos/TTmineuropazoom.gif
Tmax in southern France was at most around 37°C yesterday. At 20:30 UTC you will be able to find tha updated map of today (18 Aug 2009) daytime Tmax around Europe at:
http://www.uni-koeln.de/math-nat-fak/geomet/meteo/winfons/
TTmaxeuropazoom.gif
Back to the vineyards, the season has started one week earlier in northern Italy while it will be late in Sicily that, as you know, is the southernmost part of Italy (even of most of Europe). The quality of white grapes is optimum.
http://www.winenews.it/index.php?c=detail&id=16825&dc=15
Sicilian wines are getting better and better in the last decades. In the past, southern Italy vines were used to make French wines more robust (because of its low alcohol content). Now southern Italy grapes are used to make excellent wines.
Flanagan (11:18:07) :
Southern France is havong quite a heat wave for the moment – more than 40 celsius in many places. Spain and Italy are not safe either. In Spain, several places had 30+°C… during the night!
==============
Still not a single Hotwave Record…just average Summer Temperatures.
A little web searching produced this, from Eric Asimov in the NY Times in 2007:
“THE 2003 vintage in Europe has been characterized as bordering on the bizarre. The weather was extreme, particularly in France, where a long, deadly August heat wave challenged winemakers.
Skip to next paragraph
Tony Cenicola/The New York Times
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Readers’ Opinions
Forum: Wine and Spirits
Problems caused by the heat are most evident in white wines. Accelerated ripening meant acidity was lost, and because of this the whites lack their characteristic freshness and vivacity.
But red wines are another story.
From almost every part of France, I’ve found the 2003 reds to be remarkably successful.”
Oops — some sidebars got put in. The key parts I meant to quote are:
“THE 2003 vintage in Europe has been characterized as bordering on the bizarre. The weather was extreme, particularly in France, where a long, deadly August heat wave challenged winemakers.
Problems caused by the heat are most evident in white wines. Accelerated ripening meant acidity was lost, and because of this the whites lack their characteristic freshness and vivacity.
But red wines are another story.
From almost every part of France, I’ve found the 2003 reds to be remarkably successful.”
Hyperboreans wine!
Has HE bought some lands up there? …If HE hasn’t then don’t worry. Anyway, HE is not supposed to believe in his own prophesies, that is for us fools and believers alike.
Dave Stephens (11:17:02) :
The grapes of wrath!!…Not to laugh at all, those were years of drought and no grapes…
I had to get this one in: A good French Whine!!
Nah, Scottish make Whiskey, not wine. Wine is girly booze. No True Scotsman would make wine.
You know, this could be a parody. The French sometimes make good parody economic parables, like:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candlemakers%27_petition
“Help, help, global warming is creating COMPETITION!” If you have any doubt as to the anti-market political orientation of warmers, well…they fear that AGW may threaten their vice grip on the wine industry. Darn that capitalism!
Actually, the parallels are striking:
“We are suffering from the ruinous competition of a rival who apparently works under conditions so far superior to our own for the production of light that he is flooding the domestic market with it at an incredibly low price; for the moment he appears, our sales cease, all the consumers turn to him, and a branch of French industry whose ramifications are innumerable is all at once reduced to complete stagnation. This rival, which is none other than the sun, is waging war on us so mercilessly we suspect he is being stirred up against us by perfidious Albion (excellent diplomacy nowadays!), particularly because he has for that haughty island a respect that he does not show for us.”
Albion is of course England, and “he has for that haughty island a respect that he does not show for us” is a reference to England’s reputation as foggy.
And the Sun is to blame you know. 😉
Those well known climate experts the french chefs declare global warming is real?
I dont know about you chaps but I am going to rethink my whole denialist point of view, if a bunch of french cooks says AGW is real then who are we to cast doubts?
Absolutely brilliant. A lovely comedic vintage with touches of plum, raspberry and a smooth chocolate finish! There has been no fruitier well of taste (less) humor since Moliere’s “The Misanthrope.”
Can we expect the same from the shores of the States United? In February the Symposium of Professional Wine Writers packed the Culinary Institute of America to hear NY Times’ Frank Priel discuss wine and climate change. Stay tuned.
More… sobering: Senator Nick Minchin, Leader of the Opposition in the Australian Senate gave a blistering speech today:
“This is of course the perpetuation of a cruel hoax on the Australian people, childishly simplistic and misleading. The scheme proposed does not deal with carbon. It purports to deal with something quite separate—carbon dioxide emissions—and the scheme does not deal with pollution.”
http://tinyurl.com/q9tq3w
Flanagan (11:18:07) :
If you look here (+39° 20′ 50.22″, +8° 58′ 5.04″). That’s where we used to park our 2 mobile avionics workshops back in the late 70s early 80s.
Out on the pan where you see the aircraft parked was regularly 120ºF+
If you go a few hundred yards North, there’s a road running roughly East-West
Follow that back to the ‘H’ blocks which was where we bunked. I can’t remember where the club was exactly but the overnight was regularly close to 90ºF this time of year.
DaveE.
timetochooseagain (12:55:49) :
Don’t tell the Scots they make whiskey, that’s the Irish!
The Scots make Whisky!
DaveE.
Most current day French vineyard rootstocks were and are originally imported from Texas from the native wild mustang grapes that grow across Texas. This rootstock saved France’s grape industry in the early 1900s when phylloxera decimated the wine and vineyards of Europe.
So what are they worried about – it really gets hot in Texas and they already have the correct rootstocks.
This is a publicity stunt by Greenpeace and some minor domains…
As for the “heatwave” July was cold and rainy for most of France.
Diogenes (11:25:23) : You wrote: “I notice that on your map Chablis seems to have migrated to Provence.”
This is a poor map for various reasons but the one you mention is actually that Provence is not labeled at all, even though it is shown. So the problem is the brownish colors are too similar and even the map-maker got lost.
I once used this map for a presentation and had to fix it first.
The French just don’t know how to market climate disasters. Anybody remember the “Ice Wine” post? Now that was some imaginative marketing. Maybe the French could come up with something like natural sunkissed “raisin” wine! Or Vine Aged Wine.
Wine was introduced in France mainly by Romans and vine survived in France since 2000 years through Little Ice Age and Medieval warm period. So don’t worry !
This article was wroten in the newpaper Le Monde who is a huge RCA catastrophist … and very sensitive to NGO, Greenpeace for his article …
http://www.actualites-news-environnement.com/21295-changements-climatiques-professionnels-vin-alarme.html
http://qc.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/090811/sciences/environnement_vin_climat_r__chauffement_1
And the UK telegraph forget Greenpeace …. ? !
We will be drinking french wines for a long time to come.
Wine from Schotland? I don’t think so.
I guess French chefs might just as well get in there and argue the science. The door has been opened to everyone. And why should Scotland not be allowed to have a wine industry. On second thought, skotch might have to be made in Greenland.
Dave Wendt (11:45:37) :
You’re too late. Wine harvest dates have been used as a climate proxy for decades (see for example Le Roy Ladurie 1967. Histoire du climat depuis l’an mil, Chapter 2). As a matter of fact it is probably one of the better proxies, correlation with the average temperature of the growing season is excellent during the instrumental period. Ladurie also notes that the warmest years usually had the best vintages. Sarkozy would probably profit from reading him, particularly since he is one of the greatest french historians.
As unmotivated and blase as the French are, you would think they would welcome the change: More alcoholic content -> get drunk quicker -> don’t have to spend as much money on cigarettes. Seriously, is this all they have to worry about over there in France?
AGW means the French get fried, their wines are toast. Frankly, it’s l’absurde.
Well hard cheese, didums to them, then.
Aye Laddie, would that be a red wine or white to go with me kippers?
tty (14:51:34) :
Dave Wendt (11:45:37) :
You’re too late. Wine harvest dates have been used as a climate proxy for decades (see for example Le Roy Ladurie 1967. Histoire du climat depuis l’an mil, Chapter 2)
Hey, just because it’s been done before shouldn’t be that much of drawback. From what I’ve observed of “climate scientists” they’ve all been repeatedly beating the same small herd of dead horses for decades, all the while having no difficulty garnering the next research grant from the government science trough. Governments here and worldwide have invested more than the combined cost of the Manhattan and Apollo projects in funding “climate research” which has lead to a state of human knowledge that is now just about as clueless regarding the climate as it was 25 years ago. Given that. I see no reason why my vital wine tasting…er…wine derived temperature proxy analysis project should be denied funding. The politicians have been doing their best to drive me to drink for years, it’s about time they offered to pick up the tab.
Dave Wendt (11:45:37) :
I’m more than willing to offer my expert biological processing & analysis to your project.
As long as I’m not required to
sampletest the ‘Deci Red’ A concoction sold by the 5Ltr plastic container just outside the air base at Decimomannu Sardinia. I will leave that one to less discerningtaste budsbiological analysts. 😉DaveE.
What? French wines are in jeopardy? Now that’s a climate change effect that all connoisseurs should really worry about!
Flanagan (11:18:07) : Southern France is havong quite a heat wave for the moment – more than 40 celsius in many places. Spain and Italy are not safe either. In Spain, several places had 30+°C… during the night!
40C, 104 F, my God Man, that’s almost a nice day for a swim! (Where I grew up, that was what we called “normal” for just about any July or August day, and “cooled off a bit” for some… Highest I personally remember was 117F, with lots of days 110F and any day in June, July, August, and parts of May / September could be over 100F).
“Not Safe”? 30C is “not safe”? 86 F is “not safe”? I now live in the “cool part” of California near the coast and there have been times it was well into the 90+F range at night.
What kind of wimpy people can’t take 40C ?
One of my favorite vacations was in Phoenix Az in summer. There was that odd moment when I got out of the (solar heated) swimming pool and into the “hot tub” only to find that the (required by law to be regulated temperature) hot tub was colder than the pool … at 105F for the “hot” tub and about 115F for the pool …. The pool had dark tiles set in the bottom for solar heating with visual flair, but they put a few too many in for August… IIRC, the air temp was 120F or so that day. It was the same year they shut down the airport because the tarmac was melting in the sun… IIRC it was 126F or so near the tarmac. We decided not to move to Arizona. (I liked it, but the spouse, not so much)… Still remember the discussion we had in the car after hearing on the radio that the airport was melting, flights were cancelled, and airplanes were being routed to the concrete for parking… wonder what the melting temperature is for asphalt… Now THAT was a warm day… actually changed into shorts when we got back to the hotel and decided to skip the steak and have a chef salad for dinner. Oh, the shame… AND I ordered an oversized soda. It was so stressful… 😉
Did I mention they have wineries in Arizona …
http://www.catchwine.com/wineries/arizona/
And one of the longest growing seasons and highest productivity per acre of the nation?
True story, BTW…
It seems that grape growers started global warming in the first place:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/science/08/18/ancient.global.warming/index.html
Well, (French) farmers anyway.
/sarcasm
A single malt wine, light, fruity, just a hint of peat.
Definitely Scottish.
E.M.Smith (17:27:20) :
Personally, I didn’t like the 90ºF nights in Sardinia, nor the 120ºF+ days. It was however ‘safe’ just personal preference. 😉
DaveE.
Back in ’96 I worked a fire out of Phoenix,really hate that tanker base at Sky harbor.
One, the days were consistently 110+ meaning 120+ on the ramp-and 130+ in the
DC7-which had all the environmental controls taken out.The USFS ramp had put steel plates out so we wouldn’t sink into the ramp.BTW-the Weather SErvice was next door
and the Stevenson Box was right next to the USFS ramp.To this day I hate Gatorade…
We had a problem with #4 and ended up back at Winslow,beatiful, windy cool 97F.
Winslow we never went back…
France? Sounds like a regional change, not a global one.
E.M.Smith (17:27:20)
wonder what the melting temperature is for asphalt…
It’s been close to 20 years since I was actively involved in the highway business, but as I recall the proper mixing temperature for asphalt cement was 300-320 degrees F, although it varied a bit depending on the grade of the material. Part of the design theory of asphalt pavements involves the idea that passing traffic will pull material to the surface to replace what is lost to weathering. Since airport taxiways are subject to much less traffic at lower speeds than highways they may spec a grade with a lower melt point, but I’m only guessing on this since the only runway jobs I was ever involved in were portland concrete. BTW, to give you some idea of what it takes to handle 747s dropping out of the sky, the last runway project i worked on at the Mnlps airport had 39″ of steel reinforced concrete.
To all my English friends, especially the ones in Hartlepool, including you, Mr. Capp….
Where art tho o’ grape,
Grape of English vine?
They glory is now,
And the French do whine.
Pleasure me nose,
With pepper bouquet.
Whilst to the south,
They swig their tart tokay
Oh yea, oh yea,
For our global warming.
And ice free lands,
Of Scottish mooring.
From green of North,
To the white of Dover.
We’ll plant thee vine,
To please the world over.
For the French too long,
Hath claimed a false glory.
The time doth fit,
To bring end to their story.
Where art tho o’ grape,
Grape of English vine?
To thee I sing,
And my tongue doth pine.
Opps, sorry. left of the “U” and thou…
Afghanistan is looking like it will have the best grape harvest in over 35 years, following on the heels of the best wheat harvest in 32 years.
The grapes on my porch here in Kabul are putting a bit of stess on the frame this year. It was a good crop last year, but this year is incredible.
Sadly, they don’t drink their grapes due to the strictures of Islam. (At least not publicly.) I’ll bet they could compare well to Spanish wines if they had a mind to produce wine.
Oh, and our temps in Kabul this year hit 37°C once this summer, never any higher. We still have a spot of snow in the mountains west of the city and the temps have already fallen off to daytime highs at 32°C and night time lows of about 16°C. It could be a cold winter this year.
I guess the French would be stuck with growing Italian, Californian, Australian and Chilean types – it might be a step up.
Everyone is missing the true danger here, what could this do to the whisky?
So there I was, flying into Paris, this past winter. The snow cover started at the English Channel and covered everything to CDG. If anything, they’ll be lamenting the fact they can only make Gewurtztraminer in the midst of some horrid future age … LOL!
The telephone sanitizers agree with the French chefs.
And I guess if it gets a bit colder, then the best wines will come from southern Italy, Spain and North Africa?
Tsk, tsk: nature’s capricious wind of fortune, eh?
REf; wine in Scotland. Well, it may come to you as a surprice but a couple a weeks ago I tasted a locally produced wine here in Sweden (Öland). This is MUCH further north than any part of Scotland. I can tell you: it tasted excellent and is a fully commercial product. (Mind you, not grown in greenhouses!) I think French wines are extremly overrated anyway, so who will be sorry?
D. King (11:49:26) :
“Save a wee dram for me Jimmy, and Lang may yer lum reek!”
Slainthe!
And what a wonderful Scottish phrase! Let that be the deniers battle cry! “Lang may yer lum reek” indeed.
(The following is a translation from the Scots for the benefit of our English and American viewers: “I hope that your chimney belches out thick black smoke for a very long time”.)
One of my brothers is a fellow beer and whisky “connoisseur” and his favourite phrase is: “I’m not as thunk as drinkle peep am I”. I don’t know where he got it from unless it was a moment of beer-fuelled inspiration.
DaveE,
since you know very well Decimomannu, I hope you can help me.
I’ve almost concluded the sourveillance of Italian WMO stations, but I couldn’t find the Decimomannu Stevenson Screen by means of google maps.
May you suggest in wich sector I should search or, better, take a photo and send it to me?
Any piece of information would be much appreciated. Thank you.
I live in France and just watched la Météo on TV;
There is an anti-sufflé approaching the Atlantic Coast which will bring outbreaks of foie gras and scattered truffles, to the Sud-ouest, followed by isolated rillettes, déglacé intervals and more persistent crêpe later.
Outlook for tomorrow : Icelandic champagne.
The Editor of the Daily Telegraph, who probably wears dark green tinted spectacles, chose not to print this brief letter – can’t think why.
Vineyards in Scotland
President Sarkozy thinks he can stop climate change to save French vineyards. (Your report 17th august). Have politicians gone collectively bonkers or is it just the silly season? If, like Senator Steve Fielding of Australia, they studied the planet’s history and sciences, they would find that even doubling or trebling present CO2 levels would hardly affect the climate.
Michael Oxenham
On a serious note, I read of a Canadian who put his life savings into planting vines in the northern limit of the Okanagon wine district, betting that with global warming it would soon be prime wine country, while California production would plunge.
He spoke as though the warming to come was a sure thing. The next spring late freezes killed of 50% of the cherry crop. Hope his young vines survived. If we could get our message out people might not make such rash decisions.
Paolo M
This seems to be an elusive one.
http://weather.gladstonefamily.net/site/LIEF
They seem to think it is in this location but are not sure.
Tonyb
Paolo M. (03:28:29) :
Sorry Paolo, it’s a long time since I’ve been there. When I used to go there, (3 or 4 times/Year, 3 weeks at a time,) it was dangerous to go to areas you didn’t have permission to enter. (2 of my friends were shot at walking back to barracks after working late.)
I can’t even remember where the control tower is as that is a likely place for a Stephenson screen.
Sorry 🙁
DaveE.
Dave,
thank you very much. I’ve already spotted the control tower but nothing resembling a Stevenson Screen.
Often the met office is located at one end of the runway.
TonyB,
that site could be a good one where I can upload photographs of all the stations I found. Thank you very much!
Jimmy Haigh (01:29:21) :
D. King (11:49:26) :
“Save a wee dram for me Jimmy, and Lang may yer lum reek!”
Slainthe!
And what a wonderful Scottish phrase! Let that be the deniers battle cry! “Lang may yer lum reek” indeed.
(The following is a translation from the Scots for the benefit of our English and American viewers: “I hope that your chimney belches out thick black smoke for a very long time”.)
And for those not steeped in, er, tradition… A proper whisky is made from barley malt that has had a strong infusion of smoke from smouldering peat. Yer lum must mightily reek to get a good flavour… (though I suspect the original is more about keeping the house warm).
One of my brothers is a fellow beer and whisky “connoisseur” and his favourite phrase is: “I’m not as thunk as drinkle peep am I”. I don’t know where he got it from unless it was a moment of beer-fuelled inspiration.
For some reason I get an echo of a “Laugh In” episode with Goldie Hawn… I think the full quote was:
“I’m not under the alkafluence of inkahol that some thinkle peep I am. It’s just the drunker I sit here the longer I get.”
Which I dredged up from :
http://ifindkarma.com/oneliners/oneliners-2000
Which includes things like:
“I’m opposed to millionaires, but it would be dangerous to offer me the same opportunity. — Mark Twain”,
“I’m perfectly capable of being a grouch emeritus arguing priority claims in 2025. — Rohit Khare”,
“I’m pink, therefore I’m spam.”
But we all know,
Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder…
so you might like something else better.
Don’t know who cooked up this variation, but I’m pretty sure it is not the original”
Starkle, starkle, little twink,
Who the hell are you I think.
I’m not under what you call,
The alcofluence of incohol.
I’m just a little slort of sheep,
I’m not drunk like thinkle peep.
I don’t know who is me yet,
But the drunker I stand here the longer I get.
So just give me one more fink to drill my cup,
‘Cause I got all day sober to Sunday up.
And then this one got me wondering about the merit of some of the climate statistics we have. Like “Global Average Temperature” that seems to me to be just about as valid:
A 2006 study found that the average American walks about 900 miles a year.
Another study found that Americans drink an average of 22 gallons of beer a year.
That means, on average, Americans get about 41 miles per gallon.
So fill me up! ….
At any rate, I can’t find a reference to “first use” for thinkle peep…
And
Mike McMillan (18:05:13) :
A single malt wine, light, fruity, just a hint of peat.
Definitely Scottish.
Had me giggling… But, aye, lad, I’ll be havin’ the fortyfied single malt wine.. with lots ‘o peat… and good oaky overtones.
Found this variation too:
And here’s one for the road or the end of the day or whatever sink your glass is drinking…
I had 12 jugs of hard cider in my cellar and was told by my husband to empty the contents down the sink, or else!! So I said I would.
I pulled the cork from the first jug and poured the contents down the sink, with the exception of one glass, which I drank. I pulled the cork from the second jug and did likewise, with the exception of one glass, which I drank. I then pulled the cork from the third jug and poured the cider down the sink, with the exception of one glass, which I drank.
I pulled the cork from the fourth sink and poured the jug down the glass, which I drank. I pulled the cork from the next jug and drank all but one sink of it, throwing the rest down the glass. I pulled the sink from the next glass and poured the cork from the jug. Then I corked the sink with the glass, jugged the drink and drank the pour.
When I had everything emptied, I steadied the house with one hand, counted the jugs, corks and glasses and sinks with the other, which were 29, and as the house came by, I counted them again and finally had all houses in one jug, which I drank.
I am not under the alcofluence of incohol as some thinkle peep I am, nor are I half so think as they drunk I am, but I fool so feelish I don’t know who is me, and the frunder I stand here the longer I get.
__________________
From: http://www.webproworld.com/jokes/60818-da-joke-thread.html
Any further exploration of the origins of “thinkle peep” I’ll keep to myself… unless I find an attributed origin or merit.
E.M.Smith (15:29:42) :
Good stuff! This is another thing I find here on WUWT – we have a sense of humour here. This peculiarly human quality is, I find, compeletely absent on pro AGW sites such as RC…
“As flagships of our common cultural heritage, elegant and refined, French wines are today in danger,” 50 leading names from the world of French wine and food wrote in an open letter. “Marked by higher alcohol levels, over-sunned aromatic ranges and denser textures, our wines could lose their unique soul.”
Le Phooie! Le Pitooie!
Have not bought French wines since 1967 – overrated, imo.
Except of course for Champagne and ChateauNeuf-du-Papes.
And there was that matter of Charles de Gaulle in Montreal, when he said “Vive le Quebec Libre”.
To bad we helped them out in WW1 and WW2. If we had not, the French would be speaking German today, and they might even be polite.
I suppose it would be asking too much for them to actually be grateful.
Sorry to be harsh, but there was much MacRae blood lost in France.
On a brighter note, what, pray tell, would be wrong with a fine glass of West Highland White Savage (Sauvignon Blanc)?
Perhaps Eilean Donan Castle could become a winery in due time.
Perhaps it once was, in warmer times…
http://www.eileandonancastle.com/
Instead of French, try a fine Italian Amarone or Ripassa, or a Barolo.
There is so much to consider about climate change. I have limited knowledge. However, I am a certified permacultureist (Dry Land farming emphysis, South Australia, Priject Alpacas). Irrespective of the realities – as yet hazy, I suggest, our only option is to create biocompatible ways of living. We know how in all kinds of bioregions. We will probably not do ot enmass till enough of us die of resources lack or are killed by equally stupid preditors. However, we CAN make a difference by supportig and maybe even joiningi those who have got together to live in harmony to get food, fibre, shelter and transport as safelly and eco-harmoniously as possible without the arogance of any idology to impeed our searching for local natural reality and working with it first to survive, and then to create a healthier, safer, even ‘posher’ way of life than even the most fortunate of us have ever know.
This is just words. I will post articles when I get the hang of blogging and can correct my spelling – which was never good! Then, I hope, we can discuss for REAL action.
Leigh
eagledreaming.ws drsnca@gmail.com
Sorry for hitting an old entry but I’ve just watched the TV news and they were talking about Jerez wines (aka Xerez, a region in Southern Spain, one of the warmest regions in Europe) they are harvesting the grapes right now. They expect to make more wine thatn last year, and that taking into account that this year has been very warm in Spain (unlike in other countries).
So, no worries about French wines being in danger. If anything, they should be worried about the new rival wines being produced in places like Chile or Australia.