You may soon be drinking Swedish Merlot or Montana Chardonnay, as climate change starts to end traditional wine production in places like France and California. But winemakers in traditional wine-growing regions are trying to fight back against the rising heat. Can technology keep grapes growing in Napa for a little longer?

The challenge is huge. Grapes are known as canaries in the coal mine of agriculture and climate change: As temperatures heat up and places like California and the Mediterranean get drier, ultra-sensitive vineyards will be one of the first crops to fail. By 2050, some experts predict that as much as 85% of wine production–at least with traditional varieties of grapes–will disappear in places like Tuscany.





In Australia, where some vineyards are already starting to move to cooler regions, the Vineyard of the Future is researching ways to adapt. One solution: Using fleets of drones to take detailed shots of the grapes, analyzing that data with an app, and then using automatic irrigation and fertilization to target specific vines that are suffering in a heat wave or drought.

Wine producers have been using sensing and remote imaging for decades, but drones suddenly make the process cheap and more accurate.

“People used to rely on satellite technology or airborne techniques,” says Sigfredo Fuentes, the University of Melbourne researcher who leads the Vineyard of the Future. “It’s expensive, and low resolution. You don’t get much information, and you can’t afford to do it often. Now with drone technology and multicopters, you can do your own monitoring–as long as you comply with regulations.”





The researchers are working on an app that will automatically analyze the images using algorithms, since right now, the process takes careful, time-consuming analysis from an expert.