Climate change: Warm winter ruins German ice wine harvest | Hacker News Reader

Climate change: Warm winter ruins German ice wine harvest

bbc.com

38 pointselorant27 comments

Something similar is happening in multiple European countries e.g. Helsinki has not had over-night snow (snow that stays for two consecutive days) this winter and it's likely it won't happen.

We are not sure what kind of butterfly effects this or other stuff (e.g. big lakes not freezing for the first time in recorded history) will have, but it's quite scary.

https://yle.fi/uutiset/osasto/news/finland_experiencing_mild...

The skiing industry is going to take quite a pounding. I imagine many resorts that did not have to rely on artificial snow are going to go bankrupt or outright close within the next decade.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_wine#Germany “Germany Throughout the 19th century and until 1960, Eiswein harvests were a rare occurrence in Germany. Only six 19th century vintages with Eiswein harvests have been documented, including 1858, the first Eiswein at Schloss Johannisberg.[2] There seems to have been little effort to systematically produce these wines during this period, and their production was probably the rare result of freak weather conditions.”

I can count at least 3 years in past 10 years without required temperatures for ice wine production. Even in years with harvest we see it later and later in winter, which leads to loss of grapes due to the rot making it not economically viable anymore. 20 years ago you did ice wine harvest in late November/early December. Now you are lucky harvesting in mid January.

Ice wine is the only wine I like (sweet).

I prefer dry. I think ice wine is gross, but I wouldn't want to ruin it for others.

I recommend investigating the world of sweet and foxy wines: Concord, Catawba, and Muscat wines.

Another single year observation attributed to climate.

"2019 was the second-warmest year on record globally, according to the US National Oceans and Air Administration"

The link between climate change and problems with ice wine production in Germany by lack of ice seems pretty direct.

It was the first time ever that the ice wine harvest failed. This isnt a trend.

Meanwhile, in Wyoming: "This Winter Has Been One Of The Snowiest On Record For Wyoming, And It’s Not Over Yet"

https://www.onlyinyourstate.com/wyoming/snow-storms-in-wyomi...

more snow doesn't mean it is colder

But more cold does frequently mean less snow.

After a certain point the air is just to cold to hold any humidity.

Things are shifting around.

Simple way to imagine it: take the first interactive graph at https://www.intmath.com/trigonometric-graphs/2-graphs-sine-c....

Imagine x=2π is Wyoming, x=3π is Berlin, y depicts average winter temperature. Expected situation is b=2.5; current situation is b=2.75.

This is of course a silly example, but illustrates the idea of what happens when you push around parameters of a periodic function. Weather is spatially periodic.

At some point one may look at all these single year observations in aggregate, and realize a certain trend...

This was the first time ever that the ice wine harvest failed. How is that "all these single year observations"?

Did you "single year observe", when the arctic ice fields expanded?

Another single year after year after year of record breaking weather. You might call it a "trend".

This is a stereotypical first world problem. I think calling attention to it risks trivializing the serious effects of climate change.

I disagree. For some, this might be the proof that is needed to make them realize something is wrong.

In the eyes of apocalypse, we are all the same.

Because people loosing their livelihood is a 'first world problem' and not one of a series of important problems? Or because it's in Germany and not somewhere more 'relevant'?

I try to find a charitable reading of your post, but so far I've failed.

Well, loosing your job, or preferred wine, is a different kind of problem, than loosing your island. Thats what he or she meant.

Unfortunately all the people who are going to make the decisions about whether the world burns are first-world people, and their problems are the only ones that they care about.

Crops failing is a first world problem? I think you have it backwards.

Please explain the reason why you think they have it backwards. Does the "first world" survive on not-crops?

The first world, for as long as that has been a term, has had more than sufficient supplies of food. Unlike many other parts of the world in the same period of time.

I think there are couple of assumptions that I want to point out.

Having more than sufficient supply of food translates to having reliable supply chain of food. With increased globalization, supply chains have become more specialized. This has allowed us to have access to a wide variety of goods and services at competitive prices. But it has come at the cost of supplier dependence. As we are currently experiencing in the Covid-19 outbreak, global supply chains are sensitive to disruptions from global events. Hence, this is a global issue.

Last year, minor variations in supply of Avocados had people talking in the Bay Area. On this very page, we are talking about effects of climate change on wine production. A population which is used to a reliable and consistent supply of goods is more susceptible to variation in the same. Hence, I think crop failures are very much a first world problem too.

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