TC Firm's Tech Protects America's $23 Billion Annual Investment In Wine

TRAVERSE CITY -- Americans purchase an average of five gallons of wine annually on a $23 billion investment. How come so many of them let the wine go bad?

Two words: "improper storage."

Now the Tellurex Corp. of Traverse City has created a safe, secure and cost-effective thermoelectric technology for wine enthusiasts and wine cabinet product designers that not only protects wine in long-term storage but also assures that it is served at the correct temperature.

Just north of Tellurex headquarters, there are seven wineries in the Old Mission Peninsula American Viticultural Area. The Old Mission Peninsula AVA sits close to the 45th parallel, a longitude known for growing prestigious grapes in Europe as well as the United States.

Tellurex is a world leader in thermoelectric technology -- in medical devices, defense applications and heated and cooled cup holders for vehicles, including the Cadillac Escalade Platinum Edition.

Now, Tellurex has put that knowledge to work on the problem of wine storage. And a real problem it is -- if you put the wine in a rack in ambient temperature, then the bottle temperature will rise over 70 degrees during the summer, causing the wine to accelerate maturation. If the temperature exceeds 90 degrees, the wine may be ruined in as little as 24 hours.

Not only that, but if you store the wine in a conventional vapor compression refrigerator, over time the cork will dry out, triggering a fungus that emits a compound called 2,4,6-trichloroanisole (TCA), ruining the wine with a dank, nasty stench.

And if you refrigerate the wine in a purpose built cabinet and pump up the humidity to preserve the cork, conventional thermoelectric coolers will corrode, losing up to 48 per cent of their cooling power in less than 90 days.

The Tellurex Wine Solution addresses all three concerns with its C2 family of corrosion resistant coated Peltier devices.

In Tellurex laboratory testing, the technology used in the Tellurex TWS cooling system demonstrated effective performance across 100,000 cycles of full Delta T to room temperature testing. Contrast this to a loss of 48 per cent demonstrated by conventional uncoated TEC modules as sold in many conventional wine coolers and cabinets in as little as 2,016 hours or just 84 days.

The TWS Peltier system is centered in the company's sweet spot of products. Tellurex is the only company to offer automotive heated and cooled cup holders that keep brewed coffee at the National Coffee Association of the USA's recommended temperature (see www.tellurex.com/about/cup_holder.php) while at the flip of a switch cooling drinks to refrigerated temperatures.

Now Tellurex is also offering wine storage technology that will accommodate the full range of storage and serving temperatures as recommended by BetterTastingWine.com without corking the bottle or corroding the coolers.

The key to this performance is the thermocycling capability of the Tellurex Peltier module design. Within the wine cabinet, individual sections may be set to optimum storage temperatures with a 0.1-degree accuracy. If desired, wines in long-term storage may be cooled below serving temperatures to slow maturation and then thermally adjusted to the exact recommended serving temperature just before opening.

A Gallup Poll taken a few years ago found that 65 per cent of Americans consider themselves drinkers and that the preference for wine had jumped over beer to 39 per cent of this consumer group.

If your wine cabinet has Tellurex TWS technology, your part of this $23 billion annual investment will remain sound for years to come.

For more information, email sales@tellurex.com or call (231) 947-0110. Please visit www.tellurex.com.