Lirac

What is made here

Wine colours

Colours the rules allow. Pick a colour to filter the rules and grapes below.

Where it is

Lirac in France

Latitude: 44.0°–44.1° N
Vineyard altitude: 23 m to 164 m
Delimited vineyard land: 1,309 ha

Worked out from the boundaries (smallest container first). Uses the delimited parcels where INAO publishes them.

The delimited vineyard parcels themselves, so the shape is patchy: only land within them may grow the wine. Boundary: INAO parcel delimitation (Licence Ouverte); nearby parcels drawn as one block, with less detail for larger appellations. Country outlines: Natural Earth. Dots on the zone map are the vineyard points used for climate.

Showing every colour The colour filter changes the rules and grapes. Climate, vintages and soils describe the vineyards, so they stay the same.

01 · What the law says

The rules

Limits on grapes, yields, ripeness and ageing that every wine labelled Lirac must meet.

5 wines in the rules, all colours.
Wine	Main grape(s)	Max yield t/ha	Max wine hl/ha	Yield ceiling hl/ha	Grape sugar min. g/l	Grape ripeness min. % pot. alc.	After enrichment max. % alc.	Sugar max. g/l
Lirac	Cinsaut, Grenache, Mourvèdre +1	–	43	–	–	–	–	–
Lirac	Cinsaut, Grenache, Mourvèdre +1	–	43	–	–	–	–	–
Lirac	cinsaut / grenache / mourvèdre / syrah, Grenache, mourvèdre / syrah	6.5	41	43	–	12.5	14.5	3
Lirac blanc	bourboulenc / clairette / grenache blanc / roussanne	6.5	41	43	196	12	14	3
Lirac rosé	cinsaut / grenache / mourvèdre / syrah, Grenache, mourvèdre / syrah	6.5	41	43	–	12	14	3

From the official production rules (cahier des charges). Hover a figure to see the clause it comes from. A dash means the rules set no figure, or it is not captured yet.

Blend rules

– cinsaut / grenache / mourvèdre / syrah · Main grape
≥ 40% Grenache · Main grape
≥ 25% mourvèdre / syrah · Main grape
– carignan / clairette rose / counoise / grenache gris / marsanne / piquepoul blanc / piquepoul noir / roussanne / ugni blanc / viognier · Allowed
≤ 10% Carignan · Allowed
≤ 10% clairette rose / counoise / grenache gris / piquepoul noir · Allowed
≤ 5% white grapes · Allowed

Blend rules

Lirac blanc

≤ 60% bourboulenc / clairette / grenache blanc / roussanne · Main grape
≤ 30% marsanne / piquepoul blanc / ugni blanc / viognier · Allowed

Blend rules

Lirac rosé

– cinsaut / grenache / mourvèdre / syrah · Main grape
≥ 40% Grenache · Main grape
≥ 25% mourvèdre / syrah · Main grape
– carignan / clairette rose / counoise / grenache gris / marsanne / piquepoul blanc / piquepoul noir / roussanne / ugni blanc / viognier · Allowed
≤ 10% Carignan · Allowed
≤ 20% white grapes · Allowed

Other varieties allowed

Besides the main grapes, the rules allow these varieties in some wines. Grape names link where a profile exists.

10 varieties · 4 wines

Carignan, Clairette Rose, Counoise, Grenache Gris, Marsanne, Piquepoul Blanc, Piquepoul Noir, Roussanne, Ugni Blanc, Viognier

4 varieties · Lirac

Marsanne, Piquepoul Blanc, Ugni Blanc, Viognier

In the vineyard and cellar: rules for every wine

4,000

Vines per hectare, minimum

Training

Systems allowed

gobelet; cordon de Royat

Permitted

Irrigation

02 · Climate fingerprint

The climate

The growing season averages 19.4 °C, hot on Gregory Jones's scale, with 2,002 growing degree days (Winkler IV).

The average year 1991–2020, vineyards at about 95 m

Monthly mean, °CRain, mmGrowing season

Growing-season temperature: 19.4 °C; Hot · 19–21 °C (Jones)
Growing degree days: 2,002; Region IV: 1,944–2,221 degree days
Growing-season rain: 454 mm; Of 778 mm a year
Harvest rain: 202 mm; September–October

Copernicus ERA5-Land monthly averages at 5 vineyard points (Vineyard point 1, 130 m; Vineyard point 2, 22 m; Vineyard point 3, 234 m; Vineyard point 4, 25 m; Vineyard point 5, 63 m), moved to each point's height from the model's terrain. Indices that need daily data are not captured yet. How the climate figures are made.

Closest climates in the database

Picked by the data, not by hand: the profiles nearest on season warmth (counted twice), degree days, rain, ripening-month nights and day–night range. Neighbours within 30 km are left out, as they share the same weather.

1. Bianco di PitiglianoVery similarCompared with Lirac: same season warmth, similar rain.

2. Terre TollesiVery similarCompared with Lirac: same season warmth, similar rain.

3. SavutoVery similarCompared with Lirac: same season warmth, similar rain.

Growing-season temperature

Lirac

19.4 °C

Bianco di Pitigliano

19.4 °C

Terre Tollesi

19.4 °C

Savuto

19.3 °C

Growing degree days

Lirac

2,002

Bianco di Pitigliano

2,003

Terre Tollesi

2,004

Savuto

1,997

Growing-season rain

Lirac

454 mm

Bianco di Pitigliano

473 mm

Terre Tollesi

435 mm

Savuto

463 mm

03 · Year by year

35 vintages

Each column is one growing season: heat above or below the 1991–2020 average, and rain at harvest. Pick a year for the details.

Warmer than averageCooler than averageHarvest rain (Sep–Oct)Average harvest rain, 202 mm

2025

Growing-season temp.
Growing degree days
Harvest rain
Growing-season rain
September nights
Hot days and frosts

Seasons are labelled by harvest year (April–October). Year-to-year changes from ERA5-Land; tested against station records in Alto Adige (r = 0.94 for season temperature at Bolzano). Rain varies more locally, so treat single-season rain with some caution. Vintage ratings, harvest dates and frost or hail events have places in the data model but are not loaded yet.

04 · Where the numbers come from

Sources

A geospatial inventory of regulatory information for wine protected designations of origin in Europe · Candiago et al., Scientific Data 9, 394 (2022); Eurac Research · CC0
Quality wines in Italy and France: a dataset of PDO specifications · figshare 25393261 · CC BY 4.0
ERA5-Land monthly averaged data (reanalysis-era5-land-monthly-means) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), Climate Data Store · CC BY 4.0 (Copernicus licence)
OpenStreetMap vineyard areas (landuse=vineyard), from Geofabrik country extracts · OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL 1.0
Copernicus DEM GLO-90 (AWS open data tiles) · European Space Agency / Copernicus · Copernicus DEM licence
Cahier des charges: Lirac (Cahier des charges de l'AOC Lirac homologué par l'arrêté du 4 juillet 2024, publié au JORF du 7 juillet 2024 - BO n°29 du 18 juillet 2024) · Ministère de l'Agriculture (Bulletin officiel), as linked by INAO · Official act
Délimitation parcellaire des AOC viticoles de l'INAO · Institut national de l'origine et de la qualité (INAO), via data.gouv.fr · Licence Ouverte / Open Licence (Etalab)
Appellation nesting worked out from boundaries (pipeline/build_nesting.py) · Vinous, from the Eurac PDO boundaries · CC0 (source data)
Climate profiles calculated by Vinous: method

Still to check (3)

Generated from EU reference data: check against the current product specification.
From the specification: The register lists only 'Lirac'; the text covers still red, rosé and white, so white and rosé are recorded as 'Lirac blanc' and 'Lirac rosé'. Grape limits apply to the farm's vineyard (white: each principal ≤60%, each accessory ≤25%); in the blend principal grapes must be the majority, and accessory grapes are limited to 10% (red) or 20% (rosé) when black and white grapes are co-fermented. Minimum sugar for red and rosé grapes is 216 g/l for grenache and 207 g/l for other black grapes, so it is left null. Residual sugar may reach 4 g/l when natural alcohol exceeds 14%. No minimum planting density (maximum 2.5 m² per vine); viognier and old syrah may be Guyot-pruned; total production above 45 hl/ha loses the appellation; sorting of the harvest is compulsory and wood chips are prohibited.
National tier (DOC/DOCG) not captured yet; rules extracted from the specification text.