There are hundreds of web sites that admonish against storing onions and potatoes together.
Downey Potato Farms says: Do not rinse potatoes before you store them and avoid placing them with onions because, when close together, they produce gases that spoil both.
MarthaStewart.com gives a similar warning, as does Tony Tantillo.
Arrayed against this powerful majority are just a few pooh-poohers.
The University of Minnesota Extension Service contends: There is absolutely no truth to the story that potatoes and onions should not be stored together because one makes the other sprout. The truth is, they have different storage temperature requirements. The optimal storage temperature for potatoes is 40 degrees, the temperature at which onions sprout.
Another dissenter (who to my eye claimed no special pedigree) wrote an article on vegetable storage for the Helium website:
The hardest part is in knowing what should be and can’t be stored with other produce. Storing tomatoes and apples together generally results in rotten tomatoes. Storing potatoes, onions, and garlic together, on the other hand, actually prolongs the amount of time they are considered fresh.
Does anyone have any further confirmation, one way or the other?