If you’d told me twenty years ago that Bordeaux would be planting Touriga Nacional and Albariño, I’d have thought you’d had one too many. The climate emergency presents vital challenges encouraging sustainability across the world of wine from vineyards to packaging, shipping and decisions on the wines we choose to buy. With drought-resistant grapes thriving in searingly hot places such as Vermentino across the Mediterranean or Assyrtiko in Greece, there is a fascinating new section in the great library of grape varieties spreading across the globe. Jim Barry, for instance, has successfully planted Assyrtiko in Australia’s Clare Valley and his ‘The Aegean’ Assyrtiko 2023 is in Majestic for around fifteen quid, a bullseye zinger of a wine. A reminder of Australia’s creative innovation – and a mighty impressive wine to boot.

Forgotten local grape varieties can provide inspiration too. Plaimont Producteurs in southwest France have recently reintroduced Manseng Noir to the Côtes de Gascogne IGP. A member of the Tannat family, it naturally ferments with a magically low degree of alcohol, barely exceeding 11.9% even in hot summers. Alongside the climate emergency, such hidden gems also resonate with the trend for lower-alcohol wines. Here in the UK, innovative crossings such as PIWI grapes can deliver impressive resistance to fungal diseases with a noteworthy reduction in reliance on pesticides. The decades to come will be some of wine’s most innovative, leading to new frontiers of flavour as we navigate our changing climate, balancing a love of wine with care for our planet.