The Brief

In California's Napa Valley, cabernet sauvignon is king.

The bold red wine has made the region world famous, with some bottles retailing at hundreds of dollars. But increasingly severe heat waves are taking a toll on the grape variety, especially in late summer during ripening. As temperatures keep rising, the wine industry is slowly confronting a future where Napa may not be the prime cabernet region it once was.

In the face of climate change, wineries around the world are innovating. New technology is being installed to keep the grapes cool during heat spells. A handful of wineries are going a step further. They're experimenting with new grapes, ripping out high-value cabernet vines to plant varieties from hotter climates.

The goal is to find heat-tolerant grapes that blend well with cabernet, potentially making up for the flavors that cabernet could lack when temperatures get even hotter. While many bottles labeled cabernet are already blended with other grapes in small amounts, winemakers may need more flexibility in the future.

"We know we have to adapt," says Avery Heelan, a winemaker at Larkmead Vineyards in Calistoga, Calif. "We can't just pretend that it's going to go away, because all we see is each year it's getting more and more extreme."

Still, blending with other grapes comes with risks. For a U.S. wine to be labeled cabernet, a bottle must contain 75% cabernet grapes or more. Any less, and it's considered a red blend. Blends typically don't command the same prices on store shelves as cabernet, especially since consumers are accustomed to picking U.S. wines by the name of the grape. Moving away from cabernet would be a major financial gamble for Napa's multibillion-dollar wine industry.

"It is a big shift," says Elisabeth Forrestel, an assistant professor of viticulture and enology at the University of California, Davis. "Without the market changing or demands changing, you can't convince someone to grow something that doesn't sell or doesn't garner the same price."

University of California, Davis research assistant Jacob Vito crushes cabernet sauvignon grapes from Napa Valley to analyze their chemical compounds. The lab is studying how heat is affecting the grapes.

(

Ryan Kellman

/

NPR

)

Charbono, anyone?

Some grapes growing at Larkmead Vineyards aren't ones that many American wine drinkers would recognize. Long rows of vines are labeled: touriga nacional, aglianico, charbono and tempranillo.

"There's not a huge market for a lot of these varieties," says Heelan, walking among the vines on a hot summer afternoon. "We're really choosing them not from popularity, but for their qualities."

Established more than a century ago, the winery is known for its bottles of cabernet sauvignon. These lesser-known grapes were planted only a few years ago, part of a research vineyard that took the place of cabernet vines.

"Which most people would probably think is a little crazy, considering it's 3 acres of perfect cabernet land," Heelan says. "But certainly with the climate and how dramatically it's changed over even the last 10 years, we really have to start adjusting."

Winemaker Avery Heelan is growing several rare grape varieties at Larkmead Vineyards in Napa Valley, in the hope that they'll blend well with cabernet grapes as temperatures get hotter.

(

Ryan Kellman

/

NPR

)

The vineyard is already at the hotter northern end of Napa Valley, but the extreme heat in recent years has been a wake-up call. A late-summer heat wave in 2022 hit temperatures just under 120 degrees at the vineyard, she says.

"When it gets that hot, the vines, they're done," she says. "They're going to go dormant, and when that happens, they're not ripening anymore."

In extreme heat, cabernet grapes can lose their rich color. They also dehydrate, wrinkling like raisins, which produces wines that are sweeter and more alcoholic. Heelan says the grapes that the vineyard is testing could provide an added boost of color or acidity to cabernet, helping balance out the wine when temperatures take their toll.

The experiment has its cost. In addition to the lost revenue from removing cabernet, grapevines take up to five years to produce their first crop, plus several more years for the wines to ferment. Heelan says only then will they start to see how the new grapes are performing. But the goal is to prepare the winery for the future, knowing that heat will likely get worse.

"Honestly, the more we experiment and learn about how to adapt, I think the wines are just getting better and better," she says.

In hotter temperatures, cabernet grapes lose their rich red color and produce sweeter, more alcoholic wines.

(

Ryan Kellman

/

NPR

)

Where cabernet is king

Farther south, Shafer Vineyards sits in the heart of Stags Leap, a Napa wine region that's known for high-end cabernets. Winemaker Elias Fernandez says the grapes benefit from a cool evening breeze that blows in from San Francisco Bay.

This summer, heat has already been a problem. July was the hottest July on record in California. Fernandez points to a grape cluster where small green grapes are nestled among larger purple ones.

"This is effects of the heat," he says. "It’s not maturing, so this is where you lose some fruit."

Winemaker Elias Fernandez is installing new technology at Shafer Vineyards in Napa Valley to combat heat waves.

(

Ryan Kellman

/

NPR

)

The damage isn't too widespread this year, unlike in 2022. But with summers getting more intense, Fernandez says the winery is looking at technology to help the cabernet vines. They're currently installing misters, which spray water into the air to cool the temperature.

"It's a constant mist," he says. "How many of you have been to a party where they have misters? Doesn't that feel good? Well, that's what the vines are feeling."

Still, using extra water is a challenge in drought-prone California, he says. Plus, the water droplets can concentrate the light on the grapes and burn them, so misters must be run until the sun sets to keep the droplets from collecting. But Fernandez says he's hoping the misting will keep the cabernet vines producing at the highest level.

"I think the first thing we'll be doing is mitigation, hoping to keep it as the true varietal of Napa Valley," he says. "That's what we're trying to do — is buy time and see what happens with this whole thing."

For now, he's not considering planting other grape varieties. With wines that are priced at $100 and up, cabernet is central to their business.

"For me, it's hard to think that people are just going to throw cabernet out the door and plant something else," he says. "I really do. It's the king of the wines of the world."

To keep producing high-quality cabernets, Napa Valley winemakers may need to blend them with other grapes to balance out the effects of heat. But wines labeled as blends, instead of cabernet, often sell at lower prices.

(

Ryan Kellman

/

NPR

)

Wine regions are shifting

Professor Elisabeth Forrestel is studying how Napa's wine regions are shifting with climate change.

(

Ryan Kellman

/

NPR

)

Elisabeth Forrestel is one person trying to understand the big swings in the temperature. In her lab at UC Davis, her research team is smashing Napa Valley grapes inside plastic bags. They'll be analyzed at the molecular level to see how they change during the summer.

Forrestel's lab is gathering wine grapes from Napa Valley throughout the growing season, along with detailed temperature data, to see how the most crucial compounds for wine are affected by heat. Studies show the average temperature during the last 45 days of the growing season in Napa — when grapes ripen— has already warmed almost 3 degrees Fahrenheit from 1958 to 2016. But it's the intense heat waves that do the most damage to molecules that produce a wine's color and aroma.

"When you have these extreme heat events, you can have a lot of impact on the development of that flavor profile," she says. "If it was just an average change, it would be a lot easier to manage."

Forrestel is working on updating a central guide for winemaking, known as the Winkler Index. Developed in the 1940s, it shows the ideal locations to grow different varieties of wine grapes, based on how much heat they receive. Napa Valley was originally indexed for cabernet sauvignon, but this could shift as the climate gets hotter.

With cabernet being the world's most widely grown wine grape, cabernet vines are resilient to different temperatures, Forrestel says. It's a question of whether Napa winemakers may need new strategies to keep it producing at such a high-quality level. Since grapevines last 50 years or more, winemakers are faced with making planting decisions today that will need to withstand a hotter future.

"Some of the paradigms in what you would plant need to shift," she says. "People need to have different approaches so there can be more resilience and you can have more options."

UC Davis research associate Martina Galeano prepares grape samples. Wine grapes need heat for ripening, but too much heat can break down some of the crucial compounds for wine flavor and color.

(

Ryan Kellman

/

NPR

)

Would you pay the same for a blend?

Blending cabernet with other red grapes could be one strategy. But since U.S. regulations require any bottle labeled cabernet to contain 75% cabernet, at some point wineries may be looking at changing their labels to say "red blend."

"We have a perception that a blend is not as high quality as getting that high-quality cabernet, and they're not on the same price point, so it is a big shift," Forrestel says.

The challenge is particular to U.S. winemakers, since many other countries label their wines by region, instead of grape. The famed red wines from Bordeaux in France are already a mix of six grapes, including cabernet, so winemakers have more flexibility. Winemakers there have also struggled with heat, so French authorities recently approved four more red-grape varieties for blending. Since the wines are labeled with Bordeaux, wine drinkers may not even notice the shift.

Wines in the U.S. are generally labeled by the grape variety, a system that was promoted when the domestic wine industry was growing in prominence decades ago. In an effort to compete with wines from Europe, some thought focusing on the grape variety would demystify wines for consumers and show the quality of American wines.

Now, that system may work against them. Cabernet sauvignon is the most popular red wine in the U.S., according to NielsenIQ. So Forrestel says consumers are also part of the solution by creating demand for wines that are better suited for a hotter climate.

"Be open," she says. "Because I think it's really easy to walk in and buy what you're used to. And also, trust what you like and not what you're told to like."
Copyright 2024 NPR

In his monthly briefing Thursday, the leader of the massive Port of L.A. complex said the port shutdowns in the Persian Gulf and slowdowns in European and Asian ports caused by the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran are not rippling to Southern California.

“We right now don't see any of that congestion happening, but it just may,” said Port of L.A. Executive Director Gene Seroka. “No one has the answer at this point in time of how long this war is going to continue and for what duration the Strait [of Hormuz] will remain closed.”

Shipping across the Pacific Ocean to U.S. ports on the West Coast, Seroka said, is so lucrative that companies are making sure container ships are not delayed. Most of the trade through the port complex is with China, Japan and Vietnam.

“I don't think you're going to see a significant impact on the West Coast,” said Ron Widdows, a former ocean carrier CEO who joined Seroka during the briefing.

The war with Iran will mark its second week Saturday. The conflict’s economic upheaval has upended politics and economies in the Middle East. European and Asian countries are feeling the ripple effects as trade along the Strait of Hormuz has slowed.

Southern California consumers will feel the effect on the pocketbook

The war’s effects on rising prices at gasoline stations in the U.S. is also leading to price increases in cargo ship fuel, known as “bunker.”

“Those bunker prices effectively doubling right now are passed on almost immediately, and in some cases with a 30-day notice, to shippers, [and] they'll be passed on to the cost of those goods,” Seroka said.

For now, container volume at the Port of L.A. is good, with 812,000 container units moving in and out of the L.A. port last month.

“That's about 3% higher than last year and 11% above the five-year average for February, both positive signs,” Seroka said.

A disruption in trade through the massive SoCal port would affect hundreds of thousands of jobs in the five-county Southern California region. Port of L.A. trade accounts for 17% of all waterborne container international trade into the U.S.

As the federal investigation related to Los Angeles Unified’s superintendent continues, the district’s acting leader and the elected board face key decisions about the district’s finances and negotiations with unions poised to strike.

This on top of the day-to-day tasks of running a school district that employs 83,000 people and enrolls more than 400,000 students across more than 1,000 schools.

“This removal of [Superintendent Alberto] Carvalho, which is understandable under the circumstances, comes at the very worst time for the system,” said Pedro Noguera, dean of USC’s Rossier School of Education.

LAUSD’s board voted unanimously to place Carvalho on paid administrative leave two days after FBI agents searched his home and office in late February. The reason for the searches is unknown. A DOJ spokesperson said the agency has a court-authorized warrant but declined to provide additional details.

While Carvalho has declared his innocence and expressed a desire to return to his job, the district says an investigation is ongoing.

Which means, for now, longtime administrator Andres Chait will continue leading the country’s second largest school district through a series of pressing challenges.

What does an acting superintendent do?

This is not the first time in recent history an acting superintendent has led LAUSD.

Vivian Ekchian stepped in to lead the district in 2017 when then-Superintendent Michelle King was out on medical leave; King stepped down altogether the following year. Ekchian previously served as associate superintendent and, before that, an elementary school teacher, principal, administrator and chief labor negotiator.

“The role of the acting superintendent, from my perspective, is not different from the actual superintendency,” Ekchian said. “The work needs to get done, and it doesn't stop.”

When asked about the acting superintendent’s decision-making power compared to the permanent position, a district spokesperson wrote in a statement that “acting superintendent is a board-appointed position and carries all responsibilities and authority afforded the position of district superintendent.”

Ekchian said the superintendent’s decisions are guided by the district’s existing strategic plan, consultation with other senior leaders and community partners.

“If there's an urgent matter, like a fire or something that requires immediate decision-making, systems and structures are in place for organizations and departments to know what to do next with immediate guidance from the superintendent,” Ekchian said.  ”All decisions aren't the same, and the urgency is dictated by the matter at hand.”

Like Ekchian, Chait rose through the ranks from teacher to administrator at LAUSD over nearly three decades.

The responsibilities of his most recent role, chief of school operations, included overseeing school safety, athletics and the district’s office of emergency management. The salary for the chief of school operations position is $278,205 annually (the district did not indicate whether his salary has changed).

Since being named acting superintendent, Chait has appeared on the district’s social media, but the district has declined to make him available to LAist or other media outlets for interviews.

In his first verbal statement to the public on Monday, March 2 before a closed board meeting, Chait said his priority as acting superintendent is to keep the district focused.

“We remain committed to academic excellence and student wellbeing,” he said. “Our core values remain unchanged. I know transitions can create uncertainty, but our district is strong.”

Mounting pressure from labor

On Tuesday, the board approved labor agreements with the unions representing school police, support staff supervisors, office personnel and other classified staff.

But contract negotiations with the district's largest unions, those that represent teachers and school support staff, have stalled. Members of both United Teachers Los Angeles and SEIU Local 99 voted overwhelmingly in January to give their leaders the power to call a strike.

An IT worker and a gardener, both in positions targeted for reductions, were among the union members that addressed the LAUSD board.

(

Mariana Dale

/

LAist

)

“ A strike is always the last resort,” said Maria Nichols, president of Associated Administrators of Los Angeles, the union representing principals, on Tuesday. “None of us — AALA/Teamsters, UTLA, SEIU — want to go on a strike and be disruptive for our students, our families, our school communities, especially at a time when LAUSD is already navigating uncertainty.”

More than a hundred school support staff and other union members filled the chambers Tuesday as Nichols and other representatives addressed the board.

Alex Orozco, UTLA’s secondary vice president, told the board that negotiations were “not anywhere close” to being settled. (The following day, the union announced the most recent step of negotiations, “fact-finding,” ended without an agreement.)

In past negotiations, the district’s superintendent has been a lightning rod for the union’s criticisms. In 2018, for example, UTLA weaponized then-Superintendent Austin Beutner’s calendar ahead of a strike.

The unions’ approach to Chait has been restrained so far.

“ The problem our members are facing, and students, is a systemic issue. It's not an individual,” said Max Arias, executive director of SEIU Local 99, in an interview with LAist. “We have to continue to attack the system, but I'm trying to hold out some hope that [the acting] superintendent will, you know, understand what we need to get done.”

The unions plan to hold a rally in downtown Los Angeles on Wednesday.

At Tuesday’s board meeting, Chait described a first week on the job spent visiting with teachers, principals, students, support staff and labor partners.

“As someone who's been a teacher, principal, held a number of roles in the district, I understand that you are indeed the backbone of this district,” Chait said. “The work simply just does not happen at schools or at offices without you. My commitment to you is to always come from a place of transparency, honesty and dialogue.”

Cutting back on spending

Part of the labor negotiation challenges are related to the district’s financial constraints. In February, a divided board voted to send layoff notices to more than 650 employees as part of a plan to cut spending.

Even as California is poised to fund schools at record high levels, Los Angeles Unified and other districts have grappled with increased costs.

For example, LAUSD hired more staff to support students during the pandemic, and now the federal relief dollars that initially funded those positions are gone. For the last two years, the district has relied on reserves to backfill a multi-billion-dollar deficit.

Noguera, with USC, said the budget is the district’s most immediate priority.

“There's no easy solutions,” he said, “and I think that's part of the reason why they've held off for a while on making tough decisions.”

The financial report presented Tuesday indicates that the district will continue to spend more money than it brings in over the next three years. Still to be determined are how the outstanding labor negotiations and the state budget will affect LAUSD’s spending plan for next year.

Defending immigrant families

Since the start of President Donald Trump’s second term, Los Angeles educators — and those around the country— have said the increase in immigration enforcement actions contributed to lower attendance and fewer students enrolled in school this year.

Thousands of Los Angeles Unified students have walked out in recent months to protest the Trump administration’s militarized crackdown on immigrants, detainment of children and violence against U.S. citizens protesting the raids.

Thousands of students from schools across Los Angeles walked out Wednesday, Feb 4, 2026 in peaceful protest of the Trump Administration’s immigration policies.

(

Mariana Dale

/

LAist

)

In response, the district has expanded summer school and transportation options, distributed “know your rights” information and asked the federal government not to conduct immigration enforcement actions near schools. Teachers and community organizations have also volunteered to patrol schools before and after school.

On Tuesday, the board instructed staff to review contracts with outside vendors and evaluate whether they support or enable immigration enforcement and detention.

Chait, whose own family immigrated from Chile in 1983, said the district’s work to support immigrant families will not change during his tenure.

“Please know we stand with you,” Chait said Tuesday. “We will support you. We will ensure that our campuses are safe, secure and welcoming environments for our students and staff.”

A theater project bringing the world of William Shakespeare to local veterans is gearing up for its first public performance on Sunday.

For the past year, a group of about a dozen veterans have met at the West Los Angeles VA campus to study the work of the Bard of Avon.

The project is a partnership between the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles and The Veterans Collective. The group is led by trained theater artist — and fellow veteran — Aaron Lyons.

Lyons is a longtime staple of L.A.’s theater community and is a member of the Antaeus Theatre Company. He said seeing this group express themselves through these timeless works has been inspiring.

“Helping them grasp Shakespeare, not only intellectually but emotionally, has been one of the most uplifting experiences of my life,” Lyons said.

Ranging in age from their 30s to their 70s, the group includes veterans of the Vietnam War and most of its members live at the West LA VA Campus, Lyons said.

The actor, who’s performed in more than half of Shakespeare’s plays, said part of his goal with the project was to demystify Shakespeare’s canon for veterans who might not have studied it since grade school.

“Watching this group of men and women understand it and be able to connect with it in ways that they didn’t think possible was really, really inspiring,” Lyons said.

The group will perform an original work called “Shakespeare Night Live” at 3 p.m. Sunday, March 15, at McCadden Place Theatre. The performance weaves through several Shakespearian monologues and scenes.

Tickets are $10 and available at the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles website.

The war in Iran is rattling the aviation industry, from flight cancellations to rising costs for jet fuel. So if you're planning to travel this spring or summer, should you grab a ticket now, or wait?

"You should go ahead and book," says Sean Cudahy, an aviation reporter at The Points Guy travel and personal finance website.

It's generally recommended to buy international flights further in advance than domestic trips. But in the current circumstances, Cudahy says he would go ahead and book even domestic flights.

His advice is a sign of how the Middle East conflict is rippling outward, affecting prices and itineraries around the world, beyond the thousands of travelers who were stuck after the war forced a barrage of flight cancellations.

Airlines warn that ticket prices will rise with fuel costs

The war's effect on travel was sudden and striking, resulting in the cancellation of more than 46,000 flights in and out of the Middle East from Feb. 28 — when the U.S. and Israel began bombing Iran — to March 11, according to Cirium, the aviation analytics company.

That includes Dubai International, the busiest airport in the world for international travel, according to Airports Council International, along with popular hubs in Doha and Abu Dhabi.

But even airlines far from the Mideast are facing a sudden surge in a core expense: jet fuel. At the beginning of the year, a gallon of jet fuel cost $2.11; by March 10, the price rose to $3.40, according to the Argus U.S. Jet Fuel Index, a gain of more than 60%.

The spike came after tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz came to a virtual halt, as Iran announced it would close the waterway that normally handles about 20% of the world's oil and liquified natural gas.

Mideast refineries had been sending some 470,000 barrels of jet fuel each day through the strait to airports in Europe and elsewhere, says Rick Joswick, who heads the near-term oil analytics team at S&P Global.

The price for a gallon of jet fuel soared close to $4 in the first week of the war, prompting United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby to say on Friday that airfare price hikes from higher fuel costs would "probably start quick."

As they absorb higher fuel costs, airlines could adjust prices higher across the board, or they might tuck an increase into premium fares, where they'll be less noticeable, Cudahy of The Points Guy says.

Several airlines have publicly confirmed that they'll be raising prices to compensate, as Reuters reports. Other carriers, such as Japan Airlines, publish a schedule of fuel surcharges triggered by cost increases.

"I do think that this is ultimately going to lead to higher fares for everyone," Cudahy says. "The only question now is how significant and how long does it last?"

Air travelers stranded by the Iran conflict are greeted in Athens, Greece, after arriving on a charter flight from Dubai on Saturday.

(

Giannis Antwnoglou

/

SOOC/AFP via Getty Images

)

Crisis parallels earlier global disruptions

The higher fuel prices reflect a genuine struggle to ensure the aviation industry has ample supplies, says Joswick.

"It's not irrational. It's not some trader bidding up prices," he says. Comparing the situation to the COVID-19 pandemic, he adds, "The consumption of toilet paper didn't change. But you notice that all of the supermarkets ran out of toilet paper, right? Everyone wants to be sure that they have coverage of a critical need."

Both Cudahy and Joswick compare the Iran conflict's ripple effects to Russia launching its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which set off flight disruptions and higher fuel prices. As long as the Strait of Hormuz is closed, Joswick says, prices will keep rising.

"If that were to persist, this would be like a 1979 kind of [oil] crisis," he says. "Anything over a month, and you're seeing a substantial long-term price increase until the flows are restored."

The U.S. and other large economies can mitigate those effects by tapping strategic oil reserves — which they opted to do on Wednesday. But Joswick predicts that while such a move can help ensure adequate oil supplies, it might not bring a sharp drop in jet fuel prices. For one thing, he says, the U.S. reserve focuses on holding crude oil, not jet fuel. And he cites logistical challenges, such as California's reliance on jet fuel that it either produces or imports.

Tips for buying a plane ticket right now

If you're ready to take your chances and book a flight, Cudahy has some guidance.

First, don't buy a restricted, basic economy ticket that you can't change later, he says.

Instead, he recommends buying a regular, full-fare economy ticket: "If the price does eventually drop, you can then go back and change it and capture the lower price."

Another tactic, Cudahy says, is to use airline miles.

"You can generally cancel it and get all your miles back later, if the price goes down," he says.

Use services such as Google Flights to comparison shop and set up alerts for price changes. And if you book flights through a third-party site such as Expedia, be sure you understand its cancellation and change policies, in case they differ from the airlines.

Because of the chance for renewed hostilities in and around Iran, Cudahy says he would try to avoid nearby airline hubs for the next couple of months.

But he wouldn't wait to book a ticket.

"In the same way that we're seeing relatively long lines at gas stations with folks trying to get their tanks filled up before the price goes up even more than it already has, I would be thinking the same way when it comes to airfare right now," he says.

While you might drive an extra mile or two to find cheaper gas, airlines and airports don't have that luxury when they buy jet fuel.

"Prices are always set on the margin," Joswick says. "That last airport that needs to buy jet fuel, they will pay whatever it takes to get that. And that price then becomes the standard for the whole industry."
Copyright 2026 NPR