WATER EFFICIENCY
& SAVINGS
Registration opens
Breakfast break w/Sponsor Bingo
Official Welcome & RISE Leadership Award
Break
Asking the Critical Questions Forum: “Is Water the Solution to Heat Stress?”
Lunch & Wine
Two parallel workshops–choose 1.
Transform your water management through proven metering and monitoring strategies. This hands-on workshop equips you with immediately applicable tools and systems, from installing meters to leveraging data (e.g. Badger meters, meter.me, Lumo). Industry leaders will share how their data-driven approach has led to measurable results – from rapid leak detection to irrigation optimization. Leave with concrete strategies and tools to improve your water monitoring systems, establish usage baselines, and achieve measurable water savings in the vineyard and winery.
Action Opportunities:
Ashley Boudet is the President and Founder of BCG Water, driven by an unwavering passion for water and wastewater management. Her dedication inspires clients to take a proactive role in their water operations. Holding dual licenses in Drinking Water and Wastewater Operations from the State of California, Ashley brings over nine years of expertise to the industry. She has been a trusted partner to wineries, providing tailored water and wastewater solutions, and excels in project management, skillfully coordinating efforts between engineers, contractors, and regulatory agencies to ensure seamless and successful project outcomes.
The meter.me system lets you remotely monitor and manage your water from your smartphone. All of our monitoring systems are designed for rugged environments and can be deployed in rural areas– no WiFi or power required.
Using remote sensors and cloud-based technology, users receive real-time data on their system’s water levels from the meter.me app.
Two parallel workshops–choose 1.
Through Napa Green’s innovative RISE mentorship program, Pine Ridge Vineyards has begun their transition to dry farming, benefiting from the support of Tod Mostero, winemaker at Dominus Estate. This workshop will walk through the step-by-step process of designing and implementing dry farming systems in vineyard replants. Learn how strategic decisions – from soil preparation to row orientation to pruning – create the foundation for successful dry farming. Vineyard Director Gustavo Aviña will share insights on deepening root systems and building resilience, including compelling initial results that have led Pine Ridge to commit to dry farming for all future replants.
Action Opportunities:
Director of Viticulture and Winemaking, the French connection runs strong through Mostero, who studied in Bordeaux and trained at Château Haut-Brion, Domaine de la Romanée-Conti and Établissements Jean-Pierre Moueix. He worked with Baron Philippe de Rothschild in the Languedoc and at Almaviva in Chile before returning to his native California to join Dominus Estate in 2007.
“Christian Moueix has been my guide throughout my career and has been my greatest example of a perfect winemaker. He is clear, precise and is profoundly attached to the vineyard. He has guided me from the beginning.”
After 20 years producing highly rated Napa Valley wines, Josh Mendoza-Widaman found his way back to the Stags’ Leap district as head estate winemaker for Pine Ridge Vineyards. Josh is known for his experienced, luxury-minded palate that has produced 90+ ratings on over 90% of all wines made in his career, including Wine Spectator’s #1 Wine of the Year in 2016 with Lewis Cellars. He now oversees Pine Ridge’s estate vineyards, most notably producing elegant and expressive Cabernet Sauvignon.
Gustavo Aviña, viticulture director at Pine Ridge Vineyards, grew up helping his father farm tomatoes in Mexico. When he and his wife came to the United States in 1988, Gustavo began working with some of the finest vineyard management programs in Napa Valley.
Since 2003, Gustavo has worked intimately with every Pine Ridge Vineyards estate property. He and his team understand the soils and climates of the winery’s vineyards in five different appellations: Stags Leap District, Howell Mountain, Oakville, Rutherford, and Carneros.
Join acclaimed journalist and storyteller Mark Arax as he unravels the complex tapestry of California’s relationship with water. Drawing from his celebrated work “The Dreamt Land,” Arax brings to life the historical decisions, political forces, and unfolding stories that are shaping our state’s water management. Arax will dive into the critical context behind today’s water challenges, and future considerations and opportunities for agriculture and viticulture. As a native son of the Central Valley whose own family story is intertwined with California agriculture, he offers unique insights into the complexities of water rights, usage, and stewardship. His perspective will inspire thoughtful consideration of water’s future in our changing climate.
Action Opportunities:
In the world of journalism, Mark Arax stands out as a rarity. On one hand, he is a skilled investigative reporter who unearths secrets from the depths of shadow governments. On the other hand, he is a gifted writer whose feature stories and books are distinguished by the “poetry of his prose.”
Mark digs deep in the dirt of the Golden State, finding tragedies hidden from most Californians. With equal passion, he chronicles the plight of both farm workers and farmers. His stories on the land are told from the close up of a native whose own family narrative is found in the same soil.
Mark’s newest book, The Dreamt Land, is being hailed by critics as one of the most important books ever written about the West. “The Dreamt Land is the book Mark Arax was born to write. Nuanced, deeply researched, and profoundly personal, it offers, through its history of agriculture in California, a deep dive into the soul of the state,” said critic David L. Ulin.
As extreme heat events become more frequent and intense, the wine industry faces a critical dilemma in water management. This forum will explore the rising use of water to buffer heat stress and prevent crop loss. Join globally renowned water scientist Jay Famiglietti, whose groundbreaking satellite research has transformed our understanding of water availability, UC Davis viticulture expert Dr. Beth Forrestel, whose cutting-edge research explores climate adaptation in vineyards, and Philippe Coderey, an esteemed winegrower and Biodynamic and regenerative vineyard consultant.
They will debate crucial questions: If we’re going to use water for heat stress, what are the most efficient approaches and tools? How does groundcover impact heat absorption and radiation? How do we balance immediate heat mitigation with long-term water conservation? What are win:win water-smart strategies that both protect against heat stress and strengthen agroecosystem resilience?
Action Opportunities:
Jay Famiglietti is a Global Futures Professor in the School of Sustainability, in the College of Global Futures at Arizona State University. He is Professor Emeritus from the University of Saskatchewan, where he was Executive Director of the Global Institute for Water Security, and where he held the Canada 150 Research Chair in Hydrology and Remote Sensing. He is currently advising the Silicon Valley tech startup, Waterplan, after serving as its founding Chief Scientist. Before moving to the University of Saskatchewan, he was Senior Water Scientist at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology; he was a professor in Earth System Science and in Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of California, Irvine; and he was a professor in Geological Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin.
Famiglietti and his research team use satellites to track changing water availability, and they pioneered the methods to detect groundwater depletion from space using the NASA GRACE mission. They have been working for many years towards improving hydrological prediction in climate models like those used in the IPCC. This work has driven Famiglietti’s interest in corporate water sustainability and stewardship, innovations in financial tools and data-driven reporting platforms, and international water diplomacy.
Elisabeth Forrestel studies the phylogenetic and functional basis of drought and heat responses in grapes, and ways to mitigate climate change impacts in viticulture. Her work includes incorporating monitoring technology in vineyards and using remote sensing data to help paint a fuller picture of the environmental factors that most significantly affect plant growth, berry chemistry and, ultimately, wine quality.
Philippe Coderey comes from a very long line of vine growers and farmers in southern France and Switzerland. His last name finds its roots in the old French verb ‘codurer’ – which meant to cultivate vineyards. His ancestors were named after their vocation during the 11th century. He grew up on the family vineyard in Provence, France and was fortunate to be exposed to traditional viticulture techniques through elders of the family.
He worked with his father from a young age and by the time he turned 15, he was familiar with all traditional vineyard operations from plantation to pruning and through harvest. He attended a viticulture/oenology boarding school in Provence from 1977 to 1981. He finished his oenology education at the University of Burgundy in Dijon.
HotSpot AG is a farm management tool, developed to simplify irrigation and help growers comply with ever-changing regulations. Created by a fourth-generation farm family, HotSpot AG is engineered to solve the problems farmers face in real time with an interface that is accessible by any smartphone, tablet, or computer. From these devices, you can monitor aspects such as flow, pressure, filter, soil moisture, incoming power usage, well level, reservoir level, pump status, along with current weather conditions such as wind speed, wind direction, temperature and humidity, solar radiation, and rain collection. With HotSpot Ag, you can also control the opening and closing of valves, turn on and off pumps and engines used to power pumps and wind machines, and inject fertilizers with their top-of-the-line fertigation system. All control functions can be remotely used at the touch of a button or scheduled for future use with HotSpot Ag’s intuitive and easy to use scheduling tool. With three California locations and supporting over 100 ranches in 17 different counties, HotSpot Ag has a way to fill the monitoring and/or automation needs of all growers.
Lumo is a smart irrigation solution that helps growers save water, improve crop quality and reduce costs. Smart valves with built-in sensors provide automation, accountability and digital record keeping to give growers unprecedented visibility into the health of their irrigation network. Learn more by visiting lumo.ag
The meter.me system is a water system for a changing planet®. It brings intelligent monitoring and real-time water loss alerts to rural residents, farmers and businesses, delivering superior results at a fraction of the cost of legacy SCADA systems.
Our platform combines long-range, low-power wide-area network technology, a solar-powered IoT network, and cloud automation technology to provide something rural water users have never had before: persistent visibility into their water systems, including: Remote visibility of water levels, Leak detection, Pump and valve control, Automated alerts.
Existing solutions rely on cellular connectivity, short-range Wi-Fi, and even wired networks, none of which are designed for rural environments. Only meter.me combines long-range low-power technology and cloud hosting to deliver always-available data that doesn’t depend on cellular coverage.
Napa Green is a global leader in sustainable winegrowing, setting the highest bar for sustainability and climate action in the wine industry. Napa Green facilitates systematic soil to bottle certification for wineries and vineyards, and provides the resources, tools and connections to continuously level up leadership. In 2021, Napa Green was the first sustainable winegrowing program in the world to redevelop Vineyard certification standards to focus on climate action, regenerative carbon farming, and social equity. In 2022, Napa Green and community partners launched a first of its kind, six-event Climate & Wine Symposium (Napa THRIVES now RISE) with over 65 speakers and 600 total guests.
➡️ Scroll for Speakers!
💦 Water is gold in California, where we continue to face increasingly frequent and intense droughts tied to our changing climate.
Join the acclaimed journalist and storyteller Mark Arax as he unravels the complex tapestry of California’s relationship with water, lean how to transform your water management through proven metering and monitoring strategies, hear grower experiences of transitioning to dry farming, and listen to industry experts speak about the critical question “Is Water the Solution to Heat Stress?”
Ticket link in our bio for Water Efficiency & Savings on April 29, 2025 at the Charles Krug Carriage House.
Water Efficiency and Savings Day is April 29th at @charleskrugwinery. Find information and tickets at the link in our profile ⬆️
Join us for RISE beginning on April 29th 2025! 🌱
#rise #symposium #napavalley #sustainability #winebusiness #wineindustry #napa #winery
Join us at RISE on May 7th to hear from our Speakers @cathycorison & @gracecorisonmartin! Our topic will be “Insights from 50 years of winemaking & the next generation of leadership.”
Pick up your early bird priced tickets at the link in our bio!
Join us for RISE Climate & Wine Symposium starting April 29th, 2025!
Early bird pricing is available only through March 15th so don’t delay on picking up your tickets. Remember - Napa Green Certified Members receive a special discount and information can be found in your Napa Green Newsletter.
RISE is the first of its kind Climate & Wine Symposium. Held in Napa Valley at @charleskrugwinery, put on by the team at @napagreen.
This six day event centers around the six pillars of sustainable wine growing with each day having a unique focal point and expert speakers.
Now is the time to procure your early bird pricing tickets at the link in our bio or our website: www.risegreen.org.
Please join us at RISE beginning April 29th 2025. Now more than ever, we look forward to seeing you there.
Early bird pricing is still in effect and tickets may be purchased at the link in our profile. #rise
📣 Calling All Sponsors!! RISE Climate & Wine Symposium begins again this Earth Month and it has NEVER been more important to get involved then right now.
Reach out ASAP to Anna or Megan via rise@napagreen.org if you are an interested sponsor! 🌿
Economic benefits & ROI of workshops: In a time of changing consumer trends, we want you think of us as extended members of your team. We are here to help share information of ways to not only increase your sustainability but also share with you how these things bring with them ROI, decrease in cost, consumer approval & many other economic benefits.
Join us at our All Things Bottle Sustainability Workshop on April 26th to hear from our panel of experts. Registration is $20 and the link can be found in our profile. Cheers!
‘What if things get better?’
We highly recommend you take a moment to read this beautiful piece featuring RISE Speaker @mimicasteel.
“As the predictions of climate scientists become reality, imagining a better future can feel impossible. But hope might be right beneath our feet… Mimi Casteel shows us what’s possible with regenerative agriculture.”
“Mimi’s work fills me with hope that healthy soil can create local cooling effects that bring the temperature down dramatically, remove carbon from the atmosphere, feed more people with nutrient-rich food grown on fewer acres—and give us an enriched base from which to imagine.”
Read the full story by Pulitzer finalist Karen Russell in @esquire, at the link in our bio.
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