Day: October 11, 2017

Worried California vintners surveyed the damage to their vineyards and wineries Tuesday as wildfires sweep through counties whose famous names have become synonymous with fine food and drink.

At the Gundlach Bundschu in Sonoma County, workers were not sure the grapes above the winery survived a second night of fires that have destroyed at least two wineries and damaged more.

“We haven’t been able to go up and assess the vine damage,” said Katie Bundschu, vice president of sales. “We’re in the process of salvaging what we can.”

Speedy, wind-driven wildfires that continued to burn Tuesday came as workers in Napa and Sonoma counties were picking and processing ripe grapes to make chardonnay, merlot and other wines that have made the region a global hot spot. Millions of locals and out-of-staters flock to the counties every year to sample wine, sit in mud baths and soak in the region’s natural beauty.

At least five wineries belonging to members have had “complete losses” in facilities, with another nine reporting some damage, said Michael Honig, board chairman of the Napa Valley Vintners trade association and president of Honig Vineyard & Winery. He said the group has not heard from all members, especially those in the most vulnerable parts of the valley.

“We don’t have a good idea of how the vineyards have been impacted,” he said. “The silver lining, if there is one to this fire, this situation, is that most of us have brought in 90 percent of our crop for 2017, so the vast majority of the crops have been picked.”

Most of the remaining fruit, he said, are thicker-skinned cabernet sauvignon grapes that won’t be affected by smoke.

Bundschu, a sixth-generation vintner, recounted a scary Monday night in which the flames licked at the perimeter of the winery but were beaten back by firefighters. A century-old redwood barn and her grandmother’s 1919 home were spared.

Gundlach Bundschu is the oldest family-run winery in California, started in 1858.

Bundschu was eager to dispel reports that the winery had been destroyed, as was Nicholson Ranch winery, also in Sonoma County, which posted on Facebook that news of its demise was premature.

“The winery was in the path of the fire but escaped being engulfed by the flames. We have some damage to fix. The wine is secure in our cellars. We are cleaning up and hoping to have the power back on this week,” it said.

Even wineries that were destroyed may survive. Melted and blackened wine bottles littered the ruined Signorello Estate winery in Napa Valley, but its vineyard looked untouched by flames.

Spokeswoman Charlotte Milan said she could only confirm damage to the winery and a residence, explaining that workers had not been able to go on site. She said the estate’s 2015 reds and 2016 whites were stored off-site.

The Paradise Ridge Winery in Sonoma County posted Monday that it was “heartbroken” to announce that the facility had burned.

About 12 percent of grapes grown in California are in Sonoma, Napa and surrounding counties, said Anita Oberholster, a cooperative extension specialist in enology at the University of California, Davis. But they are the highest value grapes that yield the most expensive wines, she said.

She was optimistic that the fires will not affect the wines to come out of this year’s harvest. Smoke would have to be heavy and sustained to do much damage and even then, she said, the harm would be limited to the fruit, not the vines or soil.

That means next year’s crop should be unharmed, Oberholster said.

Tourism officials said Tuesday that wine country is open for business.

Sara Brooks, chairwoman of the Visit Napa Valley Board of Directors and general manager of the historic Napa River Inn, said she has had some cancellations, but expects tourism to bounce back as it did after the 2014 Napa earthquake.

Honig said the next few days might not be the best time to sample wines, but he wants people to visit in a week or two. He is convinced the Napa brand will survive.

“We’ve suffered with pests, fires, drought,” he said. “We made it through Prohibition. This is a short-term setback.”
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Mexico’s richest man, telecom magnate Carlos Slim, said Tuesday that reconstruction from two destructive earthquakes last month will create jobs and spur growth and announced that more than $100 million has been raised for relief efforts.

Tens of thousands of homes and apartments were destroyed and will have to be rebuilt following the Sept. 19 magnitude-7.1 quake, which killed 369 people, and an earlier, even more powerful one that struck in southern Mexico on Sept. 7 with a magnitude of 8.1.

Slim said Mexico City, which was hard-hit by the later quake, should turn in its recovery phase to the kind of high-rise developments he has constructed.

“Even though it was a very sad tragedy … it will be a big factor in spurring economic activity and employment,” Slim said during a news conference called by his charitable foundation.

Slim, who at one time was estimated to be the world’s wealthiest person, did not appear concerned about the state of the economy in Mexico, where the peso has fallen nearly 6 percent against the U.S. dollar in the last three weeks.

That drop has been blamed on fears of a possible impasse in renegotiations of the North American Free Trade Agreement. But Slim said World Trade Organization rules that would kick in if the NAFTA talks founder are sufficient.

“The WTO rules are very stimulating for commerce,” he said.

Slim said private donors have raised the equivalent of about $22 million for earthquake relief and his foundation matched those donations five to one, for a total of $134 million.

The money will be used for immediate housing and food for quake victims as well as shoring up damaged historic churches and buildings while experts decide how to restore them. The funds will also go to rebuilding hospitals and schools and “constructing better housing, respecting the uses and customs of each place.”

That was an apparent reference to the states of Oaxaca and Chiapas, which were badly hit by the Sept. 7 quake. There, Slim proposed building small concrete-frame houses _ the traditional material is brick or adobe _ of about 500 square feet (50 square meters), with enough strength to bear a second-story addition if needed.

He acknowledged that the $7,000 loans the government is offering to people in Oaxaca and Chiapas may not be enough to build such homes, noting “it would be tight” to fit that budget.

Slim called for changes in building regulations to make structures more quake-resistant and said rules should require reinforcement for buildings erected before Mexico’s deadly 1985 earthquake, which spurred tighter construction codes.

As for the capital, Slim said the best thing would be for rebuilding to follow the kind of dense, mixed-use and high-rise development that his companies have done in a west-side neighborhood known as New Polanco.

Those shopping centers, museums and offices were built on the site of former factories and are close to apartment towers. Critics have called the developments sterile and cite traffic problems, however.

“It would be ideal if this could be done throughout all of Mexico City,” Slim said.
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Attorneys for the Trump administration said a federal judge has no authority to second-guess a presidential permit for the Keystone XL oil pipeline as they seek to stop a lawsuit that would block the project.

Justice Department attorneys are due in U.S. District Court in Montana on Wednesday to defend the administration’s March approval of the 1,179-mile pipeline — a lightning rod in the debate over what to do about climate change.

The TransCanada proposal would transport Canadian crude oil through Montana and South Dakota to Nebraska, where it would connect with an existing system of lines to carry oil to Gulf Coast refineries.

The Obama administration rejected the project before the proposal was revived in March by President Donald Trump, who said it would create jobs and lead to greater energy independence.

Conservation groups and Native American organizations that sued over the project argue that an environmental review completed in 2014 was inadequate. They’ve asked U.S. District Judge Brian Morris to revoke its permit.

Government attorneys said in their motion to throw out the case that Morris can’t interfere because the Constitution gives Trump authority over matters of foreign affairs and national security.

“The remedy that plaintiffs seek — an injunction against the presidential permit — is not available because such an order would impermissibly infringe on the president’s authority,” Justice Department attorney Bridget McNeil wrote.

The project’s economics have shifted considerably since the pipeline was proposed in 2008, with low oil prices and the high cost of extracting Canadian crude from Alberta’s oil sands now casting doubt on whether it would be profitable.

Opponents say those market changes undercut arguments from Keystone supporters that oil sands crude would get to consumers by another means if the pipeline was not built.

The opponents said the current market conditions should have been weighed by the State Department before it issued the permit.

“In a low oil market world, adding close to a million barrels a day of capacity out of the tar sands is a lifeline for that industry. You can’t say it’s going to find its way to market whether this pipeline is built,” said attorney Doug Hayes with the Sierra Club, one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuits.

A State Department spokeswoman said the agency does not comment on lawsuits.

A TransCanada executive in August raised doubts about Keystone’s prospects and said the Calgary-based company would decide later this year about whether to start construction.

Company spokesman Matthew John said Tuesday that the project was in the national interests of the U.S. and Canada. He declined to address the lawsuits or the pipeline’s economic prospects.

TransCanada last week canceled plans for a pipeline that would have carried crude from Alberta to New Brunswick on the Atlantic coast. The company cited regulatory delays and “the associated cost implications” faced by its Energy East Pipeline proposal.

Heated opposition

In the U.S., Keystone has faced heated opposition from landowners whose property would be crossed by the line and farmers who live downstream from river crossings.

Opponents planned a rally ahead of Wednesday’s hearing in Great Falls to draw attention to their concerns.

Among the protesters will be Dena Hoff, who farms along the Yellowstone River near the small city of Glendive, Montana, 13 miles downstream of where Keystone XL would cross the waterway. Hoff worries about a repeat of a 2015 oil pipeline spill into the Yellowstone at the edge of her property that fouled Glendive’s drinking water supply.

“They’re talking about endangering one of the most historic, iconic and economically important rivers in this part of the country,” she said.

The Nebraska Public Service Commission must decide by Nov. 23 whether to give approval. South Dakota and Montana regulators have approved the project.
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