Sugarii

Times-News

THE BIG STORY

Sunday, September 4, 2016 | B1

Sunday, September 4, 2016 | magicvalley.com | SECTION B

PAT SUTPHIN, TIMES-NEWS‌

Daniel Hepworth, son of sugar beet grower Ron Hepworth, sets irrigation tubes for pasture at his grandfather’s house July 13 in Murtaugh. The family’s farms are diversified, but sugar beets provide dependable income.

The sugar year

While beet crop flourishes, massive sugar plant preps for harvest

MYCHEL MATTHEWS

mmatthews@magicvalley.com‌

‌MURTAUGH — By 8:30 a.m. on a Thursday in late August, sugar beet grower Ron Hepworth had finished moving water and was settled in for the day at his workshop. A brown haze of smoke and dust hung over the valley, obscuring everything in the distance but a ghostly outline of the South Hills.

Hepworth, whose first memory is of learning to drive a tractor on his father’s sugar beet farm, continues the tradition with his own son and grandson. The stability of sugar beet income is a key reason his family can live a lifestyle tied to the land, and sugar beets contribute almost 10 percent of Idaho’s cash receipts from crops.

It’s a sweet deal for southern Idaho’s grower-owned cooperative.

As the Times-News documents a year in the sugar beet cycle, you’ll meet those who grow the sweet roots and those who run the largest sugar beet factory in the world.

That late-August morning, Hepworth was replacing cutter rods and bearings on his bean cutter, which he expected to use by the end of the month. The leaves on his bean plants were turning from green to a bright yellow, signaling their edible seeds would soon be ready to harvest.

The growing season had started to wind down. Hepworth’s 315 acres of malt barley were cut and threshed. His hired hand was disking barley stubble in a nearby field. His alfalfa crop was on its third cutting; Hepworth grows only enough hay — 35 acres — to feed 25 cow-calf pairs.

“I’m hoping to build that number up,” he said.

His son, Daniel, who works full time on the farm, wrestled Hooch, a 10-month-old American bulldog, who wanted to be in the middle of everything. The dog is not unlike Daniel’s 3-year-old son, Wyatt, Hepworth said: “Wherever I’m working, that’s where he wants to be.”

Then the talk turned to the business of making sugar.

A lot has changed since the buyout, Hepworth said, referring to the growers’ co-op, Snake River Sugar Co., and its 1997 purchase of the century-old Amalgamated Sugar Co. “Before the buyout, we (the growers) were at the mercy of whoever owned Amalgamated,” he said.

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DREW NASH, TIMES-NEWS‌

Farmer Craig Giles, not pictured, talks Aug. 15 about a July hailstorm that damaged his sugar beets near Hansen.

About this project Today’s story is the second installment in a special project by reporter Mychel Matthews, following a full year in the sugar beet production and processing cycle.

DREW NASH, TIMES-NEWS‌

Wyatt Wodskow welds pipe at Amalgamated Sugar Co.’s Paul factory Throughout the year, you’ll meet the people who irrigate the crop, haul July 8. Sugar production corrodes and erodes pipes, and a year-round the harvest, operate loaders or factory equipment and market the bags of schedule has squeezed maintenance into a narrow window. finished White Satin sugar. The reporting also examines many of the political, health and economic issues connected with the sugar industry.

Sugar beets must be processed Missed the first installment on May 22? Find it on Magicvalley.com by quickly, before they spoil. For searching for “Sugar Bowl.” decades, the factory would begin At Magicvalley.com, a gallery its slicing campaign at harvest — showcases more photos from And watch for the second “Sugar Bowl” installment in November in the slicing whole beets into cossettes the “Sugar Bowl” project. Also, Times-News and Magicvalley.com. similar to french fries, then exwatch video clips of wheel line tracting the sugar. It took several work in Ron Hepworth’s sugar Since then, the grower co-op has processes over the past century months to process the entire crop, beet fields. as it stays in step with advances been in control of the operation. then the factory would all but shut “We’re always looking down in technology. down until the next harvest. the road,” Hepworth said. “AlThe Paul plant and its smaller ways looking for ways to secure Model of efficiency‌ without interruption. counterparts in Twin Falls and our future.”

While beets bulk up in Hep“We learn as we go,” Larry Nampa used to employ many seaThe sugar beet industry has left worth’s Murtaugh fields, a mas- Lloyd, manager of the Paul plant, sonal workers — especially farmabandoned factories scattered sive manufacturing machine is said during a July tour of the fac- ers who planted and grew sugar across the nation, victims of a readying to receive the crop from tory. The sugar company “owes beets in the spring and summer, sink-or-swim process of elimina- him and 750 other south-central thanks to the forward-thinking then worked the slicing campaign growers. We’re now the biggest after harvest. tion, he said. In such a specialized Idaho growers. manufacturing environment, only Theirs is a cooperative in the in the world. Without the co“It gave the farmers a winter the most efficient and adaptable true sense of the word, Hepworth op’s support, we couldn’t have job,” Hepworth said.

In the past decade, an expandsurvive. said. Growers and factory workers done this.”

That’s how Amalgamated together customize their solutions Perhaps the biggest manufac- ing factory schedule increased Sugar Co.’s plant in Paul became for harvesting the crop, preserv- turing advance is the factory’s opportunities for full-time, yearthe largest sugar beet factory in ing the beets while they make their ability to make sugar year-round, round employees. the world. The sugar company way to the factory, and keeping the rather than being limited to a few has fine-tuned the plant and its product flowing through the plant months in the fall and winter.

Please see SUGAR, B3

More online

MORE INSIDE: Amalgamated Sugar defends GMO beets, B2 | Technological advances aiding area sugar beet growers, B3 | Fractals are key to Twin Falls company’s high-tech separation, B4

THE BIG STORY

B2 | Sunday, September 4, 2016

Times-News

PAT SUTPHIN, TIMES-NEWS‌

Sprinklers on a wheel line irrigate a Murtaugh sugar beet field July 13. When Monsanto genetically engineered a glyphosate-resistant sugar beet, nearly the entire industry embraced it.

Amalgamated Sugar defends GMO beets as food makers pare down GMO use MYCHEL MATTHEWS

10 product conversions to non-GMO

mmatthews@magicvalley.com‌

‌TWIN FALLS — The first genetically engineered organism — a bacterium with an appetite for oil spills — was patented in 1980. Humulin, designer insulin produced by genetically engineered E. coli bacteria, appeared on the market two years later to lower blood sugar levels of diabetic patients.

The same year, the first genetically engineered crop was grown: a tobacco plant. And in 1994, the Food and Drug Administration approved Flavr Savr tomatoes, designed for longer shelf life than conventional tomatoes. The GMO tomato was unsuccessful in the market, but it opened the door for hundreds of genetically engineered (GE) foods, including nearly all the beet sugar produced in the nation.

It also opened the door to a raging controversy.

GMOs, genetically modified organisms, are organisms whose DNA has been altered by inserting fragments of DNA from another organism.

In the 22 years since Flavr Savrs hit grocers’ shelves, GMOs have become popular with growers who say they changed farming for the better, but are loathed by many consumers who say they present a health risk and a danger to the environment.

‘Roundup Ready’ Sugar Beets‌ When Monsanto genetically engineered a glyphosate-resistant sugar beet, nearly the entire sugar beet industry embraced it.

Glyphosate, the predominate chemical in Monsanto’s Roundup Ready herbicide, can kill a wide range of unwanted plants. Glyphosate resistance has been engineered into some crops — sugar beets, cotton, soybeans and corn — so that an entire field can be sprayed with the herbicide to kill weeds without killing the crop. The crop is slightly damaged but recovers. GMO proponents say less pesticide is used, making it safer to consumers and chemical applicators alike.

Genetic engineering also targets hard-to-control insects using Bt, a gene from the soil-borne bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis that induces a crop to produce a protein that’s toxic to insect pests.

Natural Selection Versus Genetic Engineering‌ “Humans have been modifying our foods for more than 10,000 years,” Xiaohua Yang, postdoc-

Anti-GMO group Green America’s GMO Inside campaign cited these 10 conversions in less than 2 1/2 years: Cheerios (General Mills, January 2014): Removes GMOs from original Cheerios.

Grape-Nuts (Post, January 2014): Removes GMOs from Grape-Nuts and obtains Non-GMO Project verification.

Chobani (March 2014): Commits to working toward non-GMO and organic feed for dairy cows.

Hershey’s (February 2015): Removes GE ingredients from Kisses and milk chocolate bars.

Hellmann’s (Unilever, May 2015): Offers non-GMO mayonnaise options.

Similac (Abbott Laboratories, May 2015): Introduces non-GMO infant formula.

Campbell’s (July 2015): Releases several organic and non-GMO products including organic soups and goldfish crackers made with organic wheat.

Sabra Hummus (partially owned by Pepsi, May 2016): Removes GMOs from many hummus varieties.

Enfamil (Mead Johnson Nutrition, May 2016): Introduces non-GMO infant formula.

Gerber Good Start (Nestle, May 2016): Introduces non-GMO infant formula.

toral research fellow in Cornell University’s horticulture department, wrote in a biotechnology forum. “The domestication of agricultural crops was a process of selecting certain genetic compositions that were more beneficial for human consumption. Traditional breeding continues this process.

The name for certain methods used to introduce new traits or characteristics to an organism typically involving the use of recombinant DNA methods. While these techniques are sometimes referred to as “Genetic engineering is also trying to achieve the same goal and often more directional and with better efficiency.”

Those who oppose the technology disagree.

They claim the process of blending DNA from two species is unnatural and that genetic designers are playing God. “Frankenfood” is a popular term used to portray the creepiness that many feel about genetically altered food products.

GMO proponents — including many scientists, the FDA and the World Health Organization — dispute the mountains of anti-GMO evidence, saying the claims are fear-based propaganda and that genetic engineering is safe.

“I am not aware of any solid research that confirms the danger of GMO at the moment,” Yang told the Times-News in June. Not a single case of ill health has originated from the consumption of

About the reporter Reporter Mychel Matthews earned her Master Gardener certification in 1992.

Sugar beets, however, were not on the course subject list.

these products for the past 20 years, she said, and there is no reason to expect that to happen.

But is it too soon to make that call? Anti-GMO forces say it is.

Refuted Claims‌

Before GM crops can be released to the market, they are tested in ways in which conventional and organic crops are not, Yang said.

Safety testing is done largely by certified independent thirdparty laboratories using protocols required by the government.

GM crops are also tested for their safety as animal feed and in the environment.

Despite the scientific evidence otherwise, most consumers remain skeptical of GMO safety.

Numerous surveys, including one commissioned by a group called “Just Label It,” show overwhelming — more than 90 percent — support for GMO-labeling laws.

GMO opponents — organic farming groups, some faith-based groups and grassroots consumer groups made up of women who shop for their families — say the argument is much larger than the safety issue and list numerous reasons consumers should oppose the technology: GMO crops foster monocultures, which spell bio-disaster.

Biotechnology has socioeconomic consequences and environmental impacts.

GMO seed companies squelch competition.

GMO seed developers have too much control of the seed market and represent a legal threat to growers themselves.

Also, GMO opponents refute many of the claims made by proponents, claiming GMO crops are not safe; pose a threat to the character and quality of the food supply; do not reduce pesticide use; and do not increase yields.

The FDA acknowledges the public’s perception and has written guidelines for voluntary labeling, because “some consumers are interested in knowing whether a food was produced using genetic engineering and some manufacturers want to respond to this consumer interest,” an FDA article says.

GMO foods cannot be labeled “organic,” according to law.

“The GMO labeling campaign is an effort to convince consumers that a problem exists, even though the overwhelming scientific consensus is that GE products are completely safe,” said John McCreedy, Amalgamated Sugar Co.’s president and CEO. “If there is no safety issue, there is no role for the government to play.”

Many “non-GMO” companies, such as Chobani, label their products as such. The Hershey Co. in 2015 switched from beet sugar to cane sugar for some of its most popular chocolates. Others companies have converted some of their products to non-GMO. Campbell’s, General Mills, Kellogg’s, Mars Inc. and ConAgra Foods, which all still use GMO ingredients, have announced they will label their products nationwide.

Campbell’s announced in January that it supported a mandatory national labeling law rather than “the state-by-state patchwork approach” to the issue.

“We’re in no way disputing the science behind GMOs or their safety,” Campbell’s said in a statement detailing its reasoning. “The overwhelming weight of scientific evidence indicates that GMOs are safe and that foods derived from crops using genetically modified seeds are not nutritionally different from other foods.”

GMO opponents pushed the battle to the legislative level by lobbying for labeling laws. Several states passed laws requiring labeling, while others voted down similar measures. Vermont’s labeling law went into effect July 1 but was superceded by a federal bill signed into law in mid-July by President Barack Obama that will require most food packages to carry a text label, a symbol or an electronic code readable by smartphone that indicates whether the food contains genetically modified ingredients.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has two years to write the rules.

Amalgamated Sugar supported the national labeling law.

“While we believe GMO labeling is unnecessary government regulation, we have supported the recently passed federal biotech labeling bill,” McCreedy told the Times-News. “This bill will eliminate the costly and chaotic state-by-state patchwork of laws that consumers, agriculture and food manufactures have been facing in recent years.”

Q&A with John McCreedy John McCreedy is Amalgamated Sugar Co.’s president and CEO. He also serves as chairman of the Idaho Board of Environmental Quality.

Why did Amalgamated decide to go with GMO seed, and what are the direct benefits to the company?

In 2006, our board and growers made the decision to use GE technology because it allows them to produce more sugar on less land, using less pesticides, less water, less soil erosion and less fossil fuel.

With the pushback from anti-GMO groups, is the company — or the sugar beet industry in general — considering going back to non-GMO? We cannot speak for the remainder of the industry. Our company is committed to GE technology because it is a superior farming methodology that produces a better product with less environmental impacts.

Some of Hershey Co.’s popular chocolate product are now GMO-free. Will that affect Amalgamated’s business?

No. We continue to have a market for our sugar. And we also hope that the leadership at Hershey and other companies that have switched to non-GMO ingredients will re-evaluate their position.

Socially responsible companies need to stand up to the fear and falsehoods spread by the non-GMO community, and make decisions that are in the best interests of humanity. ... The next step is for these large companies to start fighting for what is right — more productive farmland; safe, abundant and nutritious food; safer working conditions for employees; and significantly decreased environmental impacts.

Anti-GMO groups say more companies are going back to cane sugar. Is that true?

It is true that some companies have made the decision to use only cane sugar. In our opinion, these decisions are not very well informed. Multiple scientific analyses demonstrate beyond question that beet sugar from GE plants and cane sugar from non-GE plants are molecularly, chemically and nutritionally identical. The sugar is the same. And beet sugar companies have significantly improved their per-acre productivity while simultaneously reducing their environmental footprint. We have done the right thing, and once educated with accurate information, we believe consumers will begin to demand products made from environmentally responsible beet sugar.

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THE BIG STORY

Times-News

Sunday, September 4, 2016 | B3

Technological advances on the farm Sugar beet growers ramp up sharing of agronomic records, monitor beet field moisture from afar MYCHEL MATTHEWS

mmatthews@magicvalley.com‌

‌TWIN FALLS — As production costs increase and valuable resources dwindle, growers are turning to precision agriculture to farm more efficiently.

GPS systems keep equipment on track. Communication technology synchronizes movement between harvest equipment and trucks.

Weather sensors relay wind speed and direction, temperature and relative humidity in real time.

Drones will soon monitor fields for disease, pests and dry conditions. Genetically engineered crops have decreased labor costs and increased yields.

And computer technology has revolutionized growers’ ability to keep and share records — so much so that Amalgamated Sugar Co. requires its growers to share their agronomic records.

The company collects records such as planting dates, chemical applications and weather data from each of its sugar beet growers, to be pooled, sifted and analyzed “so we can discover trends that will make our members more productive and profitable,” said Duane Grant, chairman of Snake River Sugar Co., the grower-owned cooperative that owns Amalgamated. “We really ramped up in the last year.”

The information is compiled into a consistent database, turning 182,000 acres of sugar beets into a giant test plot, Grant said.

The data is then mined for ways to make growers more proficient.

“The more data points, the more accurate the information,”

PAT SUTPHIN, TIMES-NEWS‌

Ron Hepworth, pictured in a field of barley July 13 in Murtaugh, can control his center pivot irrigation system using a cellphone app. he said. The records are so important they’re required in growers’ contracts. “If growers don’t provide their data, they don’t get their check.”

reducing waste of product, fuel and labor from overlapping swaths.

GPS technology, coupled with variable-rate application systems, allows growers to apply less — or more — irrigation water to different areas in the same field.

“Changes in irrigation technology has allowed farmers to reduce the amount of water they use by using systems that are more efficient and more precisely placed,” Grant said. “With new technology we are getting the ability to irrigate different zones in the field — say, one-half inch on one part of

Global Positioning System‌ In terms of impact, GPS is the most significant technological advance so far in agriculture.

“It’s ubiquitous,” Grant said.

“Almost everyone is using it.”

Satellites track and guide farm equipment across fields to ensure complete coverage with seeds, fertilizer and pesticides, while

the field and three-quarters inch on another.”

And while a farmer still may be “outstanding” in his field, he doesn’t have to be “out standing” in his field. Growers are now able to remotely monitor and control moisture levels from afar.

“Growers are able to monitor soil moisture from sensors in the ground that transmit that info to cellphones on a 30-minute cycle,” Grant said.

“The cost of much of this technology has dropped. It’s now cheaper than using manual labor.”

Sugar Continued from B1

The Paul factory still processes the crop as quickly as possible — the slicing campaign now lasts 200 days — but the plant holds back 40 percent of the nonperishable sucrose “juice” to be crystallized after the slicing campaign ends.

The factory now operates 24 hours a day with no breaks; the movement of product through the plant is choreographed to last 11 months, so the last of the 2015 crop is made into sugar shortly before the first of the 2016 crop hits the factory.

The sugar-making process takes a huge toll on equipment.

Every summer, the factory is filled with workers who maintain, repair and upgrade the facility.

“Beets are abrasive. Sugar is very abrasive. Juice is corrosive,” Lloyd said.

Thousands of valves and miles of piping are inspected and repaired or replaced so the plant can run the next slicing campaign without breakdowns. Such work is called “prediction maintenance.”

“We have to predict what could go wrong” in order to prevent a breakdown, said Jeremy Smith, facility manager. “We can’t afford the downtime.”

Amalgamated Sugar’s three plants employ a total of about 1,600 workers, while an additional 400 seasonal workers man the 74 sugar beet receiving stations during harvest and the slicing campaign. As the Paul factory becomes more efficient, fewer employees are needed to work the slicing campaign and more are needed for maintenance and repair.

“But the maintenance and repair season is crunched down now,” Lloyd said. “And that’s the challenge.”

DREW NASH, TIMES-NEWS‌

A mechanic works in Amalgamated Sugar Co.’s Paul factory July 8.

PAT SUTPHIN, TIMES-NEWS‌

Murtaugh sugar beet grower Ron Hepworth attaches a motor to the end of a wheel line before moving it in the field July 13.

Ideal growing season‌

While the Paul plant crystallizes juice held back from the 2015 crop, Mother Nature is being kind to most Magic Valley sugar beet growers so far this year.

“No catastophes,” Hepworth said. Unlike some years.

In the first two months after sowing seeds, Hepworth made only three passes through the field: two applications of Roundup to kill emerging weeds and one cultivation to break up a hard layer of soil between the rows.

“No tractor has been in my beets since June,” he said.

The few exceptions to the near-perfect growing season include a narrow band of damage from a July hailstorm, a small infestation of the black bean aphid in some of the beet crop, and a

“It doesn’t make much sense to spend money to kill (pests and diseases) unless they are doing a lot of damage.”

Ron Hepworth, sugar beet grower few fields that show symptoms of rhizomania — called “crazy root” because of the deformed and shriveled root that results from the disease.

“We don’t worry about rhizomania too much any more,” Hepworth said. “There’s rhizomania in all the soil here, so most of us grow rhizomania-resistant beets now.”

The hailstorm set back affected

sugar beets about four weeks, so growers expect a 4-ton-per-acre loss of yields in those fields. The aphid’s effect on the crop is not yet known, but damage was enough to warrant some growers near Kimberly spraying for the insect, which sucks the life out of new foliage.

Growing a crop is all about balance — paying close attention to economic thresholds, Hepworth said. It’s costly to treat a crop for pests and diseases, and crop losses in early stages are often less than the cost of treating the pest.

“It doesn’t make much sense to spend money to kill them unless they are doing a lot of damage,” he said.

Nature’s trigger‌

With the 2016 sugar beet crop

heading into the homestretch, growers are hoping for temperatures to drop to increase its sugar content.

How does that work?

The sugar beet is a biennial: In nature, it grows from a seedling to a mature adult the first year, winters over, then flowers and produces seeds the second year.

But here in sugar beet country, the beet is harvested at the end of the first growing season, when its sugar content is highest.

During the growing season, each sugar beet plant needs a lot of water, sunlight and heat to bulk up its root. Then cool nights and shorter days signal the crop that winter is coming on and it’s time to store sugar. The plant needs sugar to sustain itself through the winter — it doesn’t know that a harvester will cut short its life before winter hits.

Beginning in a few weeks, 35,800 tons of sugar beets per day will enter Amalgamated Sugar’s factories, resulting in 3,400 tons of White Satin sugar shipped daily and maintaining the company’s standing as the second largest sugar processor in the U.S.

PAT SUTPHIN, TIMES-NEWS‌

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Ron Hepworth, right, loads his ATV onto the truck while his DREW NASH, TIMES-NEWS‌ son, Daniel Hepworth, assists July 13 in Murtaugh. Larger farms made ATVs indispensable for hauling tools and Construction is underway to expand capacity at covering distances.

Amalgamated Sugar Co.’s Paul factory.

DREW NASH, TIMES-NEWS‌

An employee works on a tank in Amalgamated Sugar Co.’s Paul factory July 8.

THE BIG STORY

B4 | Sunday, September 4, 2016

Times-News

PAT SUTPHIN PHOTOS, TIMES-NEWS‌

During a July 15 tour of Amalgamated Research LLC in Twin Falls, technical Director Mike Kearney explains how this fractal design is used to separate or blend fluids.

Fractals are key to Twin Falls company’s high-tech separation MYCHEL MATTHEWS

mmatthews@magicvalley.com‌

‌TWIN FALLS — Across Orchard Drive from Amalgamated Sugar Co.’s Twin Falls plant is an oddly shaped building with a red metal roof and the letters ARi on its front.

Inside the building resides a whole lot of brainpower.

Amalgamated Research Inc. in the 1970s was Amalgamated Sugar Co.’s research and development department. Its work focused on extracting sugar from sugar beets.

While the company was busy inventing processes for sugar refinement, it also developed processes that could be used in other industries. The company now provides industrial separation and mixing technologies to companies

“My chemistry career turned into something else. It has become a lot of engineering.”

Mike Kearney, technical director of Amalgamated Research LLC all over the world.

“Most people don’t even know we’re here,” said Mike Kearney, technical director of Amalgamated Research LLC. Even fewer know what they do.

“We sell huge (separation) processes, for the petroleum industry in China, for example,” Kearney said. Other processes soften juice and separate drug components from blood.

After several mergers, the sugar company in 1987 became part of Texas-based holding company Valhi Inc. In 1994, sugar beet growers formed Snake River Sugar Co. to buy Amalgamated Sugar Co. from Valhi. But Valhi kept ARi. Eventually the sugar company bought back its research arm, which became Amalgamated Sugar LLC. “We kept the name ARi to reduce the confusion,” Kearney said.

The company invents fractal and chromatographic systems — highly technical separation processes — for Amalgamated Sugar.

It also designs and manufactures equipment and tools to go with the processes it invents, Kearney said. Processes developed for small pilot models in Twin Falls research labs are eventually

Above: An employee walks through an Amalgamated Research LLC research laboratory July 15. The Twin Falls company creates pilot equipment to scale before creating full-scale equipment for its customers. Left: Models of fractal designs at Amalgamated Research LLC. Right: Design engineer John Buhrle explains fractal designs displayed on his computer July 15.

translated into full-scale working models in Brussels or Australia.

Most of the processes ARi invents now go overseas, he said.

“My chemistry career turned into something else,” Kearney said. “It has become a lot of engineering.”

Why fractals and chromatography?

Fractal and chromatography technologies are passive systems that require little energy to blend or separate components. Turbulence, the usual technology used in blending, takes a lot of energy

and is uncontrolled. Fractal technology, on the other hand, is related to natural structures such as tree branching and river distribution systems.

Chromatography is the separation of a mixture by passing it through a medium in which the

components move at different rates; applications of ARi’s industrial-scale systems include recovery of sucrose from molasses, recovery of fructose from starch, chemical recovery and separations of biomass such as straw, wood chips or waste paper.

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