Michigan Sugar Company is investing $125 million in improvements into its four locations—including $57 million in Croswell.
Plants in Bay City, Caro and Sebewaing will also get upgrades.
Mark Flegenheimer, Michigan Sugar Company president, said the Croswell location will receive a complete upgrade.
He said the first step in the coming year will be to install a centrifuge, which separates the sugar from the thickened beet juice.
“The centrifuge will allow us to produce more sugar and slice more beets,” said Ken Bennett,the Croswell plant manager. “We are limited by how much sugar we can produce and this will allow us to increase by 15 percent.”
The project will also include upgrades to the fluming system, beet slicers, lime kiln and the beet juice tanks.
While Michigan Sugar plans to borrow $55 million to help pay for the project, the company is also relying on raising $20 million from sugarbeet growers.
In exchange for stock in the company, growers would be required to pay 75 cents a ton for beets they deliver over the next five years. The 75 cents per ton deducted from the growers’ payments will provide the capital for plant improvements.
Flegenheimer said the buy-in is required, and there will also be additional buy-in options that allow growers to invest in the company if they want to.
Charlie Lewis, owner of Lewis Farms in North Street, farmed about 480 acres of sugarbeets last year for Michigan Sugar Company.
He harvested about 14,400 tons of sugar beets and was paid $45 to $55 per ton depending on the current price of sugar.
Lewis said the 75 cents per ton will make an impact on his profits, but it will be worth it in the long run.
“I think the investment is an excellent idea because more of the beet growing is moving to the eastern side of the Thumb area and the Croswell factory needs to expand its capacity in order to be able to efficiently process more sugarbeets into sugar,” Lewis said. “In the long run it will greatly increase our profits since more sugarbeets will be able to be processed.”
Except for temporary construction jobs, the upgrades won't increase employment at the plants.
The Croswell plant, which was built in 1902, has not had many major upgrades over the years.
“We really haven’t spent much money in Croswell compared to our other facilities,” Flegenheimer said. “And it is in our eastern region along Lake Huron which is where the major acreage of our growers are located. It is our highest tonnage area.”
Michigan Sugar Company produced 1.3 billion pounds of sugar in the past year, with the Croswell factory producing about 20 percent of that.
The Croswell plant was the lead harvester of Michigan Sugar Company with 2.02 million tons of beets harvested this past year.
“We think these upgrades will allow the factory in Croswell to exist for another 100 years,” Flegenheimer said. “We need to reinvest and upgrade in order to remain competitive.”
Samuel Moore, Croswell city administrator, said the planned upgrades show that Michigan Sugar Company intends to stay in Croswell for years to come.
“Michigan Sugar is an anchor employer, an anchor industry, an anchor taxpayer and an anchor utility customer,” Moore said. “Without them we would have a drastically different community and a vastly different local economy.”
Source: www.thetimesherald.com