So much of this article references the NYT article[0] which helpfully includes images oh said fungus.<p>[0]: <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/01/us/whiskey-fungus-jack-daniels-tennessee.html?unlocked_article_code=89-bg1lMzpnsNgVfJXyLH5hbHGITSC6M24okigstYNnxg8xCbPd9gqAJ5qYV3SPkSiukB7g-fvr4cfszzNU7WS6_DUVAw_YWw18aBndeygPyFPvHHfK0vafocjGKGEBVad2zcdntQUhrD2bYOtPmxFpYLxrX3TDDNDzQ3eI1I5xvr43D0xu2Ki2ZDiW-v4PRcdyo7ltK3b7yjKB6V8q0ZluGD9k91MWIIZIp0CKF3V9HmGb9NpkyI8dnNn_bKS25Zjbh8CWzRoBeElNAni_vAYFoVDkml32il7cxYYkXJhy5aC1lK7t0A5fCCrgwIMKwaRA8t5mw_YKB22sKqTVKFNSqnmV5gYYvfm9B&smid=url-share" rel="nofollow">https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/01/us/whiskey-fungus-jack-da...</a>
While it’s counterintuitive given how modern food and beverage manufacturing is heavily industrialised and distilled spirits being a pretty technical sub-specialty… the older more traditional distilling industry companies are full of odd little traditions. Not sure if this article mentions it, but there was other reporting that mentioned Jack Daniel’s objection to installing alcohol vapour filters rather was that not having free airflow might affect their traditional flavour.<p>The traditional notion of the angels share and the devils cut are basically irrelevant in large scale industrial distilled beverages where they are filtered at many stages and frequently shipped at higher concentrations of alcohol than the consumer will experience and then watered down with distilled/pure water by regional bottlers for tax related reasons. For reference the phrase on the nearest bottle I could grab (a bottle of Captain Morgan Rum) is “Bottled in Australia for Captain Morgan Rum Co by Diego Australia 4 Distillers Place Huntington NSW 2148 From local and imported ingredients”. The key words there being “bottled” not made, and “local and imported” which is basically how they’re describing the combination of imported higher strength original spirits and added local water to get the 37.5% alcohol by volume product that they then know how much money to give the Australian government for when they sell to their distributors. It’s not all done this way of course, you find plenty of more expensive spirits that aren’t watered down, are bottled where they are made and all of that’s very normal. But when Jack Daniel’s talks about their concerns about the flavour being affected by having filters in the airflow of their dry cask storage warehouses, it’s more than a little bit driven by the remaining traditionalism left in their craft… since the eventual watering down of their products by regional bottling plants represents a pretty significant variable in their flavour that they are ok with.
It seems like common sense to me that distilleries should be forced to use ethanol capture equipment instead of being allowed to spread the clean up and repair costs to the locals; other than "they might go somewhere cheaper" is there any reason they shouldn't?