Screw Caps, Plastic Stoppers and Corks: The Great Cork Debate!

Listen to interview with Patrick Spencer, director of CorkReHarvest.org!

Screw Caps, plastic stoppers and Corks. This major debate goes on and everyone is a bit tossed in the air about it. Most of my wine drinking friends are stuck on the idea that wine just isn’t wine if it isn’t corked and then there are people like me who are less concerned about the way the bottle looks and more concerned about the ramifications screw caps and plastic stoppers will have on people’s livelihoods and the environment.

Recently Wine Spectator published an article, Cork Screwed: Screw Caps Ace Test, backing up the screw caps and how they out perform, not only the cork, but all the various closures on every level. Apparently the Australian Wine Research Institute (AWRI) did a 10-year study testing a variety of closures, 14 total, with thousands of bottles of 1999 Clare Semillon wines made at Leasingham and the results were unanimous that the screw cap beat every other closure. Peter Godden, group manager at AWRI, concluded that most of the wines sealed with closures other than a screw cap were completely undrinkable.

The Other Side Of The Cork:

Last week while in Whole Foods, I picked up a little article put out by the organization CorkReHarvest.org, Willamette Valley Vineyards, Whole Foods  Market and The Rainforest Alliance. Even though the piece of paper wasn’t fancy and didn’t have much printed on it, what it did have was a message that was pretty powerful. There argument, I have to admit, was much more compelling than a bunch of researchers in white coats who while improving wines drinkability aren’t considering the environment or the people who would stand to suffer from loss of work.

While I see both sides to the cork controversy, the thought of people losing their livelihood when it is all they know…well that is taking someone’s way of life away from them and the thought of throwing people into poverty seems crazy to me. We now take away all that they know and make them dependent on their government, and cripple them which in my opinion, I am willing to take my chances on a few bad bottles of wine than to take away a people’s way of supporting themselves.

Here are some facts from CORK REHARVEST

Environmentally Friendly Harvesting
Cork is a 100% natural, renewable, recyclable and biodegradable material that is obtained through an environmentally friendly harvesting process

Hand-Harvest for Long Life
Trees are not cut down to harvest cork, rather, the bark is stripped by hand every 9-12 years. Cork oak trees can live up to 300 years!

Supporting Great Biodiversity
Approximately 6.6 million acres of Mediterranean cork forest extend across Portugal, Spain, Algeria, Morocco, Italy, Tunisia and France. These oak forests support one of the world’s highest levels of forest biodiversity, second only to the Amazonian Rainforest.

Providing Livelihood
Opting for screw caps and plastic stoppers directly causes the loss of sustainable livelihoods as the cork forests are a vital source of income for thousands of families.

Utilization of A Great Resource
There is enough cork in the cork forests of Portugal and Spain to last more than 100 years. The introduction of new products, such as composite corks, allows even better utilization of existing cork resources, using granulated cork that can be obtained from smaller pieces of raw cork otherwise unusable in the production of conventional punched cork.

Alternative Closure Information
Unlike natural corks, many synthetic wine corks are made from materials that are not biodegradable and are not sustainably sourced. Disadvantages of synthetic corks include; a difficulty in extracting them from the bottle, the inability to use the plastic cork to reseal the wine, and that some can also impart a slight chemical flavor to the wine.

Aluminum screwcaps are not currently being recycled due to the plastic sealer and adhesive attached to them. The production of screwcaps gives off over 10kg of CO2 per ton compared with 2.5kg of CO2 per ton for corks, according to tests conducted by Cairn Environment for Oeneo Bouchage in France. Taken from CorkReharvest.org

My conclusion: While the the screw cap seems to be a great alternative to the cork according to the AWRI researchers, I will stick with corks whenever I possibly can and support corks by recycling them. Of course I’m not going to turn down a bottle of great wine because it has a screw cap but it will make me think about those people who might be losing their jobs. Additionally, I will go to great measure to recycle my screw caps.

Listen to interview with Patrick Spencer, director of CorkReHarvest.org!

To Cork or Not To Cork: The Cork Controversy!

Yesterday as I was surfing the web researching some information for one of  my blogs and I came across this article on corks. I know all you professional fishers of men–ladies you know who you are– you might be wondering where the connection to fishing comes in, but I can assure you when I am talking about cork or cork taint…I’m not referring to fishing bobbers or men!

As of the past few years using cork as wine stoppers has been frowned upon and more and more wine makers are switching to synthetic aluminum screwcaps or other alternatives due to the pressure and as a result this has caused the great cork controversy.

Was a it a quick judgment call gone bad without the facts by our noble green friends?

On that note cork manufacturer Amorim conducted a study “Analysis of the life cycle of Cork, Aluminum and Plastic Wine Closures,” which resulted in findings that cork is the most environmentally responsible stopper!

The study “Analysis of the life cycle of Cork, Aluminum and Plastic Wine Closures,” commissioned by cork manufacturer Amorim and made public in December 2008, concluded that cork is the most environmentally responsible stopper, in a one-year life cycle analysis comparison with the plastic stoppers and aluminum screwcaps. -Compliments of Wikipedia

I found the entire article incredibly interesting, yeah I know I am a geek, and educational. For example, did you know that 50% of all cork comes from Portugal? Or that while screwcaps eliminate trichloroanisole (TCA/cork taint), it reduces oxygen exchange to zero. Everyone knows that in order for wine to age correctly it needs to interact with oxygen. Essentially what they are saying is that not only are screw caps environmentally unfriendly they reduce the quality in your yummy wines.

Go ahead read the article for yourself and share what you learned: Wikipedia! Makes for great wine trivia!

Be cork responsible and recycle! Take your used corks to the nearest Whole Foods where they go to great extents to have a recycle bin just for corks in their wine section! Thanks Whole Foods!

Additional Comments from Lucia an Italian Vintner:
Quercus suber. The cork tree grows naturally in a region bordering the western Mediterranean Sea. The major cork producing countries include Portugal, Spain, France, and Italy in Europe; and Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia in Africa.

Without a doubt, cork stoppers are the best solution for wines that need some ageing. For very young wines, wines that are to be consumed within a year or two, the screw caps could be just fine. Amorin which is a very good and serious cork producer does well in advocating the use of the cork; they are always doing valid research. However, there is so much wine being made now that whereas years ago the cork used to be harvested every 9 to 7 years, now (for most corks) is down to even 4. Corks are getting very expensive, they cost as much as a bottle and producers are often faced with cork problems. Perhaps, if screw caps were used for younger wines (vini d’annata in Italian) the wine would not suffer and there would be a greater supply of really good corks for the wines that need and merit aging. Compliments of Lucia, Vintner at  Villa Monteleone Winery in Italy