Eli5: how is it possible that a wooden barrel, which is used for aging alcohol, does not rot away.

Question

Or how do they prevent it from rotting for such a long period of time.

I cant imagine that they use multiple wooden barrels during an aging proces of 30 years or so. Because it would interupt the proces, I geuss?

In: 71

Answer 1

Would you be interested to know that the coal we dig out of the ground is compressed wood but it was from before bacteria knew how to decompose wood. So the wood just piled high on top of each other and compressed into coal (it did not rot).

Alcohol kills bacteria.