From Science News: Wine corks may owe quality to gene activity
Discovery that distinguishes superior stoppers could help reverse global downturn
Even the most superb wine won’t last without its cork, but the quality of this renewable oaken resource has nose-dived in recent years. A new genetic study of trees that produce high- and low-quality cork divulges some clues behind this decline, hinting at a possible link to climate change.
A great cork safeguards a wine’s taste and its aging process, while inferior cork can taint the vino’s flavor. Cork is made from the protective outer layer of bark surrounding Quercus suber oak trees, which grow only in southwest Europe and northwest Africa. But the global supply of cork, a $2 billion industry, has faced problems with quality and competition. Synthetic wine stoppers and metal caps offer a cheap alternative and have boomed in popularity in recent years, but oaken corks are still preferred by wine aficionados.
More here: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/wine-corks-may-owe-quality-gene-activity
Some inconvenient FAQs on Corks:
Q. Isn’t there a cork shortage?
A. No in fact, based upon current estimates there is enough cork to close all wine bottles produced in the world, for the next 100 years. The cork forests are now being more sustainably managed than ever before in their history and new planting is always ongoing.
Q. What’s wrong with screw caps and plastic closures?
A. Screw caps are not made from a sustainable product; they are not actively being recycled in the US and are not biodegradable. In comparison to a natural cork, 24 times more greenhouse gasses are released and over and 10 times more energy is used when making one screw cap.
Plastic closures are made from petro-chemicals, are not biodegradable and are rarely recycled. They are not sourced from a sustainable product and produce 10 times more greenhouse gasses than natural cork to produce.
More: http://www.corkforest.org/faq_cork_facts.php
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Ahh the old “can’t be or might not be recycled” furphy. Pray tell, if i chuck my used cork in the garbage as I suspect everyone else does,, how the hell would anyone know if it as being recycled?
Great reading on the subject…
http://www.vinography.com/archives/2008/05/book_review_to_cork_or_not_to.html
Sounds like special pleading by the cork industry to me. As a regular wine drinker I greatly prefer screw caps to corks as not only are they easier to use they are far less likely to fail allowing the wine to spoil. Given that they are mostly made with metals that are eminently recyclable the environmental impact is a red herring. If you really want to save energy the way to do that is wash and reuse the bottles, a practice that used to be the norm.
Screw caps combined with plastic closures are more often used because the result after 5 or 10 years ageing of the wine is excellent. But people has to adapt that there is an alternative for the cork
To keep corks from drying out because of global warming, they must be well hydrated. The warmunist fear mongers should be given the task of infusing water into wine bottle stoppers. They already are a bunch of cork soakers.
Cork is better? Well, maybe. But I can’t help thinking of Blind-tested soloists unable to tell Stradivarius violins from modern instruments.
increasing atmospheric [CO2] will aid cork forest regeneration. warmer temps will increase production of intracellular HSPs, leading to more “good” cork. grapes will grow better in more CO2.
So it’s win, win, win …. if you believe in >CO2 –>> global warming.
And even if its … global warming –>> more CO2 , it’s still win^3 for wine lovers.
Always remember… no climate change link = not published / funded
Previous studies have found that heat-shock proteins guard cork trees from ultraviolet light, high temperatures and drought — all of which have steadily become bigger problems in Portugal over the last century.
=================
no rise in temps since 1880………
http://hidethedecline.eu/media/ARUTI/Europe/SpainPortugal/fig11.jpg
Here’s a market response from one person buying wine in the North Okanogan region of Washington State – a fine wine producing region, I might add. I won’t knowingly buy a bottle of wine that has a man-made stopper. Use them at your own peril.
Corks do come in a range of quality and it is one of the things you takes your chances on, but I’ve personally found very few bad corks in the last 50 years and none in the last 20 years. There is a lot of crap out there that passes for wine, though.
I have a pain in one of my little toes. Climate change strikes again and causes this pain in my little toes. I know this to be true because I never got pains in my little toes prior to 1950. Of course, I was not even living prior to 1950, but that is beside the point, surely.
More ‘wine-ing’, as usual, I see.
Don’t care, Soon you will see a study that finds out the wine also detoriates because of climate change. Accept it! We live in the best of times, all changes will make it worse, especially climate changes. 🙂
metal/plastic foil is typically added to bottles tops to protect the corks from drying out. There is more material involved in protecting the corks than simply using the same material as a screw top to eliminate the corks.
Now Cork grows in more places than the two listed (Southwest Europe and Northwest Africa) I live in Sonoma County ane a number of Cork Oaks grow here quite well.
So now we have to stop AGW to save the cork industry.
Wow. You can see the next thing coming: they want special funding as AGW creates economic hardship for their industry. Now we have a study to prove it.
I have a bottle with screw cap any time over a cork one.
Ask any restaurant and they will tell you that they have far more bottles of wine being rejected by clients which had a cork then those with a screw cap.
I am sure that the quality of the cork will also play a part in that, should do a study but lack the funding, but why take the chance.
If cork quality is that important, and it is, to the aging process then these winemakers better make sure that they use good ones, otherwise use screw caps and be certain.
I wonder if cork oaks are prone the sudden oak death syndrome. Cooler and wetter than normal conditions bring it on.
Wine has a long history that predates cork closures, glass bottles, and oak barrels. It even survived the hostile activities of the English and the French. Real cork is a fascinating item but fine wine can exist without it. We named a Brittany Cork.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amphora
http://www.wineintro.com/history/glassware/general.html
As a lifelong and native resident of Cork City, Ireland I know more about Cork than most. In the last week or so I have been informed that redheads are on the verge of becoming extinct and no less an authority than Tyra Banks warns that full figured women will soon be a thing of the past. With the quality of Cork declining rapidly, I feel it prudent to move all the red headed, full figured women out of County Cork. The move won’t prevent the inevitable but it should buy the victims an extra year or two.
I searched the internet for any refutation of Tyra Bank’s scientific expertise so I’m assuming she holds advanced science degrees. I have if on good authority that her upcoming book on climate change, working title “Does global warming make my butt look fat?” brings a new perspective to the issue.
Centuries ago much of the ecology of the Iberian peninsular was destroyed to make way for cork oak monoculture. Surely a true Green would wish to change to recyclable caps and allow the original environment to regenerate?
Metal screw caps most certainly are being recycled in the US as is almost everything metal. Even if you throw it in the trash, even if you threw it in the trash 50 years ago, it is being recycled today.
And not biodegradable? It is just as biodegradable as natural free iron in the environment, doesn’t seem to be harming anything.
Really?
Whiny whackos whining about Catastrophic Anthropogenic Wine Cork Disruption?
This isn’t environmentalism. It is overt mental illness.
dp says:
July 16, 2014 at 10:09 am
“Here’s a market response from one person buying wine in the North Okanogan region of Washington State – a fine wine producing region, I might add. I won’t knowingly buy a bottle of wine that has a man-made stopper. Use them at your own peril.”
Corks are most definitely man-made. Someone has to give them their shape, don’t you think so.
Metal caps and plastic stoppers can be recycled if we will, cork can’t. But, on the other hand, when you toss your used cork it will biodegrade, metal and plastic are resistant to bio-degradation. You names yer pisin an yer takes yer pick.
Ok, PANICWHINE about WINE. Watts et al, you know I love you guys and gals, but WINE? Please, NOT the CORKS!!! Sorry, but my palate is now in dire risk of drowning in inferior climate affected wine.
New Panic Climate Alarmist.
Peace! (or not so much, you all MUST be stopped at any costs! Save the WHINE!)
🙂