Different solutions limiting the level in alcohol of wine exist or a currently on the drawing board. Some are long term and concern the selection of new varieties or the reintroduction of grapes such as Morastel or Aspiran, which when mature offer low Brix levels. Another avenue being explored: the use of yeast enabling less sugar to be transformed into alcohol. Other, more short term solutions, include diluting the alcohol content in wines, either by removing the sugar in the must or by eliminating the alcohol in the finished wine.

Two techniques already used in New World countries are currently being experimented in France, as “de-alcoholising” is not as yet an accepted oenological practice. Inversed osmosis allows, when the wine is subjected to a high pressure on a membrane, to eliminate from the initial wine the mixture of water/alcohol (P 1). It is therefore necessary to eliminate the alcohol from this mixture in order to reincorporate the endogenous water into the treated wine in view of finding a dry extract close to the initial wine. This technique, which has the advantage of preserving the wine's original aromas is being exploited by the LIR company in Bordeaux. The latter offers its clients the service of making fermented drinks with a degree of 6° from finished wine. This new product is marketed under the appellation of LIR. At present, some twenty producers and merchants have tried the product out, thereby adding this novel offering with a low content in alcohol to their portfolios.
This is also the technique used by François and Vincent Puigibet of Domaine de la Colombelle in Béziers, to reduce their premium wine’s content by a degree or two, in addition to the elaboration of a range of wines limited to 9°, which is doing well in the domestic market.

The second technique consists in eliminating the alcohol by evaporation more or less under vacuum, permitting the vaporisation of the alcohol at a low temperature. Part of the more volatile aromas is also eliminated during distillation and must be fractioned to be reincorporated in the wine which has had the alcohol removed. The elimination of the alcohol can be carried out either on the entire wine, or on a part which is highly de-alcoholised and then assembled with the initial volume. This is the most frequent method used in the countries of the New World to decrease the content in alcohol of premium wines. It is also the method used in France to make wines “without alcohol” such as “Bonne Nouvelle” by Uccoar, of which around 1.5 million bottles are sold each year.

Developped by the company Vaslin-Buscher and awarded a gold medal by Sitevi 2005, the Redux procedure brings about the reduction in sugar of must before fermentation, by using two successive steps involving selective filtrations by membrane. The advantage to this technique is it intervenes before fermentation. The wines final balance is less perturbed and the risk of fermentation being stopped by high degrees in alcohol are limited. On the other hand, the loss in volume generated by this extraction of sugar is bigger than that provoked by the techniques removing alcohol. This procedure has already been tested in Chile, in California and in Argentina. Tests have been set up this year by ITV in the Gard, in Côtes du Rhône and in Côtes de Provence. The results are expected at the beginning of the year for the rosés and by next summer for the reds.

Last but not least, Listel has selected a different technical option to make its Listel Cuvée Pink, a rosé with a 9%-degree in alcohol. The base to this wine is a selection of grape varieties, which when mature, reach a low degree in alcohol. Fermentation is stopped once the 9 degrees are achieved. The residual sugar brings about roundness and sugar in a light and fruity product which has young drinkers not yet fond of wine in mind. Listel, which launched this new product at the beginning of the summer, sold 200,000 bottles and plans on doubling volumes next year. “In my entire career, this is the first time that a new product has provoked so many reactions. I have received an amazing number of emails since it was launched,” points out David Boissier, Listel’s Marketing manager. A craze seeming to confirm this new interest in the market for wines with a moderate degree in alcohol.