Mount Mary Mailer Re; Closures

[platinum]

Interesting read in the latest mailer. I wont type the whole page out (cant be bothered) but will quote a few points they make.

As we speak theres evidence accumulating the the quality of natural cork is on the rise, Mind you the French keep the best corks for themselves.

We have no intention of moving back to natural cork at this stage but for the long term health of the enviroment it would be the best option.

Give me a cork oak forest over an alluminium smelter anyday.

Next time you are enjoying a wine under SC ponder alluminium and its toxicity to brain cells, the enviromental cost of the smelting process, the air and ground pollution associated with smelting (flurosis in particular) and the large amounts of energy (electricity) required to produce aluminium. If thats not enough consider the copper that is added to wines under SC to keep sulphides at bay. This ludicrous situation is a direct result of the SC suffocating the wine. The appropriately named SC screws the biochemistry of the bottle. We should also be interested in the amount of copper we are ingesting. Managing the overuse of copper in the vineyard is bad enough (key component of some fungicides) but adding it directly to wine is anothermatter all together- bon apetite. Strangely enough the biodynamic lobby has generously overlooked the toxicity of both copper and sulphur, deeming them 'natural; control agentsfor fungal disease. Why is it that substances that occur naturally are considered not only safe but good for us? Uranium,1080,alkaloids, lead, death cap mushrooms, hemlock, deadly nightshade and taipan venom all occurr naturallyso by this misguided logic these must be good for us. Whos first to dig in?

[griff]

Don't forget how bad the bottle contents are. Alcohol consumption isn't exactly a panacea much as we would like to think

cheers

Carl

[Craig(NZ)]

...and the air I breathe is killing me too through the awful process of oxidisation. The air I breathe is killing me too through the awful process of oxidisation.

[Michael McNally]

Some interesting points.

However....

We don't make cork here so transportation is a pollution factor.
Cork grown organically would be great, but is it? (I honestly don't know but would imagine there are some chemicals used in growing cork trees).
There is a fairly small amount of aluminium in a screwcap - the energy production value of each cap would be quite small I imagine. Less than the embedded energy of the transpoart costs?
What are the energy costs of harvesting cork?
Sulphur is used as a preservative in other foods/drinks such as processed meats (mortadella/ salami etc) and as a cleaning agent for winey equipment.
Many things that are 'toxic' in large amounts are fine in small amounts (that's what livers and kidneys are for). Tomatoes have naturally occuring monosodium glutamate - should we ban them?
Aluminium does not contain TCA!!!!!!!!!!!


That said, I love a good rant!!!

Thanks for sharing

Michael

PS I doubt the French "keep the best corks for themselves" - money talks. The best corks would be going to the highest bidder

[Roscoe]

We need copper in our diets. The upper limits legislated in Australian wines are many orders of magnitude less than what is considered toxic. There are a small number of people who have a problem with copper metabolism who may need to watch this, but most of us would develop toxic levels of alcohol well before our copper intake became a problem from wine (as Carl mentions).
There is no evidence that I know of that aluminium levels in wine are anywhere near toxic levels or indeed that they are higher in stelvin bottles. Anyone else?
Stelvins don't "suffocate wine", they just work as well as the best corks in restricting air ingress.
Copper is "natural" in that we need it as a nutrient. But I always think when people use the word "natural" that they are trying to sell me something. I cringe when I heard it used. It could be the most abused word in the English language.

[rens]

We need copper in our diets. The upper limits legislated in Australian wines are many orders of magnitude less than what is considered toxic. There are a small number of people who have a problem with copper metabolism who may need to watch this, but most of us would develop toxic levels of alcohol well before our copper intake became a problem from wine (as Carl mentions).
There is no evidence that I know of that aluminium levels in wine are anywhere near toxic levels or indeed that they are higher in stelvin bottles. Anyone else?
Stelvins don't "suffocate wine", they just work as well as the best corks in restricting air ingress.
Copper is "natural" in that we need it as a nutrient. But I always think when people use the word "natural" that they are trying to sell me something. I cringe when I heard it used. It could be the most abused word in the English language.

Combine it with the phrase '99% fat free' and I think of doing something violent to the person uttering the words

[kirragc]

In a way the environmental argument against aluminium based seal isnt too bad. Bauxite is strip mined in the north od australia under favourable goverment conditions. Transported to plant 1000s of Ks away (Weipa to Portland) where it is refined with energy provided from the Latrobe Valley coal fired plants of which they pay bugger all for compared to the rest of us. Then that plant is cooled by water from the Thompson dam which is theoretically there for the drinking water of the greater melbourne area. When you realise that Alcoa Portland consumes something in the vicinity of a third of Vics electricity output then it does seem Kinda ridiculous to manufacture closures at such a huge cost when trees will grow them at a far cheaper rate rate using a far greener energy consumption method.

Ima let you finish.......... just saying............


edit spellling godammit

[Adair]

There is no evidence that I know of that aluminium levels in wine are anywhere near toxic levels or indeed that they are higher in stelvin bottles. Anyone else?
Stelvins don't "suffocate wine", they just work as well as the best corks in restricting air ingress.

Hi Roscoe,

Based on my discussion with winemakers, there are, in general, higher levels of copper (I think you mean this as opposed to alumimium) in SC wines rather than cork or DIAM sealed wines, due to no air being allowed out of the wine at the time and just after bottling. From memory (not 100% certain), if I winemakerthinks that a wine has a chance of becoming reductive in the bottle, they would put more copper in the wine if the wine is under SC.

Happy to be corrected on the technicality and detail, but I think the general comment is correct. However, winemakers seems to have learnt much over the past decade of SC use to not require as much copper than in the early 2000s.

Kind regards,
Adair

[Nayan]

Some interesting points.

However....

We don't make cork here...

Actually, you do...

[DaveB]

Happy to be corrected on the technicality and detail, but I think the general comment is correct. However, winemakers seems to have learnt much over the past decade of SC use to not require as much copper than in the early 2000s.

Kind regards,
Adair

Hi Adair,

The study that I've seen from the AWRI showed that the numbers of wines submitted for PFC (blue fining) trials was very low in the early '00's, peaked around '05/'06 and was still fairly high in '07/'08 when the paper was published.

Not sure if there has been a further study after that paper though....I presume so.

There is some stuff on it on the following link or more in depth stuff if you trawl the AWRI website.

http://www.winebusiness.com/wbm/?go=get ... taId=58431

[Roscoe]

Hi Adair and Dave
The copper levels found by the AWRI are still quite low. The highest average is 0.49mg/l. The upper level of intake advised (by the nhmrc) is 10mg/day - this probably includes a fair margin of safety. Assuming an average intake from other sources of 3 mg/day, it would take 14 litres of wine to lift you into the potentially toxic territory. I think toxicity from ethanol is a much bigger problem than copper at these concentrations.
My comments about the aluminium were not an error. I don't know of any measurements of aluminium levels in wine. IMHO aluminium from cans or cookware is likely to be a much bigger issue but public health experts don't seem to concerned with them.
Cheers

[DaveB]

Hi Roscoe,

True...regardless the wines in our country are manipulated enough IMHO...if wineries had to put what actually goes into the wine of the label nobody would buy the stuff and the increase in blue fining is a concern as I'm sure not many people would be too happy having potassium ferrocyanide in contact with their evening tipple.

Aluminium isn't so nice for the environment, I think there can be no doubt on that, the verdict is still out on how it reacts over time with the acids and alcohol in wine...I'd certainly prefer a CONSISTENT cork closure, they may well be getting better but it's probably a bit late isn't it

Cheers

Dave

[Roscoe]

My understanding is that the wine is not actually in contact with aluminium- unless the Stelvin is faulty. Isn't the aluminium screwcap merely a method to keep the liner snugly in place, and the liner actually provides the seal? Am I mistaken in this? Then there are aluminium wine bottles - I guess these are used for wines to be drunk very young? Can't say I'm keen on this concept.

[Michael McNally]

Some interesting points.

However....

We don't make cork here...

Actually, you do...

We don't make significant amounts of cork here?

Funny that the press releases stop in 2004.......

Cheers

Michael

[GraemeG]

I think the argument was against copper being in the wine and bad for your health, and aluminium being used for the screwcap and being bad for the environment.
There was no suggestion there was aluminium in the wine.

Of course, aluminium can be recycled too, so perhaps it's not quite that bad. And if cork-TCA-ruined bottles are regarded as completely wasted, well, there's an environmental cost there too that's no longer being incurred when that wastage isn't happening under screwcap.

But the environmental argument is capable of extending in infinitely-widening circles, and without resolution, I'm sure...
cheers,
Graeme

[Roscoe]

Deleted. Re-edited below.

[Roscoe]

Next time you are enjoying a wine under SC ponder alluminium and its toxicity to brain cells,

Hi Graeme
I was responding to this, which I took to be a comment in the Mount Mary mailer. I assumed that it refers to aluminium ingestion in the wine rather than environmental aluminium pollution, because I would be even more surprised if the latter was at potentially toxic levels.
Cheers

[Sharkey]

Some interesting points.

However....

We don't make cork here...

Actually, you do...

In a first for Australia, two Portuguese 'cork strippers' - Manuel Silva and Manuel Graça - have harvested the Glenloch Cork Oak Plantation in Canberra's Stromlo Forest.

It looks like cork stripping involves a lot of Manuel labour

[Roscoe]

Some interesting points.

However....

We don't make cork here...

Actually, you do...

In a first for Australia, two Portuguese 'cork strippers' - Manuel Silva and Manuel Graça - have harvested the Glenloch Cork Oak Plantation in Canberra's Stromlo Forest.

It looks like cork stripping involves a lot of Manuel labour

A Quercy job.

[tpang]

Would anyone be able to post a scan of the mailer? It would be great just to read exactly what it contained.

[Michael McNally]

Some interesting points.

However....

We don't make cork here...

Actually, you do...

In a first for Australia, two Portuguese 'cork strippers' - Manuel Silva and Manuel Graça - have harvested the Glenloch Cork Oak Plantation in Canberra's Stromlo Forest.

It looks like cork stripping involves a lot of Manuel labour

Thanks for the belly laugh Sharkey!