Climate Change May Drastically Impact Wine Production: Where Grapes will Grow in the Future (Video)

Do you like wine? Then you may be disappointed. It turns out that climate change may be negatively impacting agriculture and food industry operations worldwide, including the production of wines.

The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, actually predicted a fall of about two-thirds overall in production in the world's premier wine regions, including Bordeaux and Rhone in France, Tuscany in Italy and Napa Valley in California and Chile. This fall could occur by 2050, which means that you may soon be paying a lot more for that bottle of wine.

As the climate warms, it becomes harder to grow grapes in traditional wine country. Researchers have noted in the past that a hotter, drier climate may force vineyards to mist grapes on the vine in order to protect them from the sun, or move sensitive vines to more hospitable terrain.

It's not just growing the grapes that would be an issue, though. Changes in climate and temperature affect terroir, the environmental conditions in which grapes are grown. Wine is sensitive to these changes, and terroir vastly impacts exactly how the beverage tastes. Major environmental shifts could also mean drastic changes in the quality of different wines.

In order to gauge the impact of climate on wine-producing regions, the researchers used 17 different climate models. In particular, they examined two different climate futures for 2050; one assumed a worst-case scenario with a 8.5 degrees Fahrenheit warming while the other assumed a more modest increase of 4.5 degrees.

In the end, the researchers found a drastic decline in wine production in Europe with an 85 percent decrease in production in Bordeaux, Rhone and Tuscany. Australia experienced a 74 percent drop while California had a 70 percent fall. Chile actually came out the best with a mere 40 percent fall in production.

That doesn't mean that wine production will stop entirely, though. Instead, producers will have to move to more hospitable locations.

"Wine is going to be on the move in the future, as will wildlife," said Rebecca Shaw, one of the authors of the paper, in an interview with the Guardian.

Yet as wine production moves, regions that are home to wildlife may be developed. In particular, areas near Yellowstone National Park and the mountains of Central China will soon be suitable for growing grapes. This could drastically impact endangered species, such as the panda.

"It's likely that the indirect impacts of the agriculture sector adapting to climate change as crops begin to move...will be bigger on wildlife than the direct effects of climate change," said Shaw in an interview with The Huffington Post.

If you like wine, you'd better get your bottles while you can. The taste and the types of wine available may soon be changing.

Want to see how climate change is affecting wine producing regions? Check out the video below, originally appearing here.