Article January 2, 1902 Issue

Making Sugar from Beets

Boston Herald

It is conceded that if America could produce all her sugar, it would be her greatest step toward complete commercial independence of the rest of the world. To raise the amount required for American consumption in our own country from sugarcane is acknowledged to be out of the question. To supply the deficiency from beets is the remedy. Few industries have shown greater progress in a decade than the beet-sugar industry. Ten years ago there were but three factories in the United States. To-day there are thirty-six.

To produce the 2,220,000 tons of sugar consumed annually in the United States would require about four hundred factories. A beet-sugar factory is the scene of many novel activities. The beets are brought into the sheds, the floors of which slope toward the centre. From these sheds, which usually have a capacity of five thousand tons, the beets drop into conduits, through which they pass to the factory proper and enter the washer.

After a thorough washing they are placed on an elevator and carried to the top of the building, where they are weighed and thrown into cutting machines. When the beets leave these machines they are in long, narrow strips. The diffusion battery next separates the juice from the pulp. After various processes the resulting sugar, as white as snow in appearance, goes to the evaporators, where it is dried by a current of hot air. It is then ready for the market. A beet arriving at the factory one morning will be transformed into sugar ready for the table by the following morning.

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Making Sugar from Beets

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