The grapes are coming off in France’s Champagne region, and they started earlier than ever. As Reuters reports, the official harvest kicked off on Aug. 12—the earliest start since records began—after record heat and drought sped up ripening and slashed acidity. Some growers got permission to begin as early as Aug. 6. “I didn’t dare wait any longer,” said winemaker Vincent Finot, after his grapes’ acidity dropped remarkably. “With great wine grapes, you want the maturation process to be slow. This is true with most fruit,” Linda Johnson-Bell, founder of the Wine & Climate Change Institute consultancy, tells CNBC.
One agroclimatologist noting French harvest dates have shifted about three weeks earlier over 50 years, and 67-year-old winemaker Denis Velut says harvests “used to be in late September and mostly in October” when he was a child. Yields are down, with frost, heat, and drought shrinking grape volume and weight; producers are leaning on reserve stocks to fill the gap. Winemakers and experts say the region may need new grape varieties and growing methods to preserve Champagne’s trademark balance, even as similar conditions boost sparkling-wine prospects across the Channel in southern England.