I’ve had a number of wines in my life that have been tainted by a poor cork. I always pity the winemaker who has been a great effort to create a pristine wine only to have it ruined by a leaching cork. Although these occasions have decreased over time, it happened to me as late as a week ago.

Cork comes from the bark of a cork tree grown mostly in Portugal. A cork tree survives for more than 100 years and re-grows the bark that has been stripped for bottle corks. But, a tree can’t be cultivated for nearly 10 years and re-grown cork can’t be harvested for nearly the same time.

A chemical development called TCA for short happens when airborne fungi come in contact with chlorophenol compounds found in pesticides and preservatives used to sterilize corks. Corks are no longer bleached with chlorine, so the incidence has decreased as cork manufacturers have analyzed TCA’s cause.

Now, Cork Supply, a Portuguese cork manufacturer, has developed at TCA extraction technology that it says can eliminate the risk of cork taint 99.85 percent of the time. Called PureCork, the process uses steam distillation.

All good news.