Sugar beet

A sugar beet is a special kind of plant. Its root has lots of sucrose, a type of sugar that people use every day. Farmers grow sugar beets to make sugar. This plant is very important for sugar factories. It is part of a big plant family that also includes foods like beetroot and chard. Even though it looks similar to these vegetables, the sugar beet is different because it has much more sugar.

Sugar beets grow best in cooler places where it is too cold for another sugar plant called sugarcane. In 2024, two countries, Russia and Germany, grew the most sugar beets in the world. Together, they helped make a lot of sugar. The rest of the world’s sugar mostly comes from sugarcane, but sugar beets are very important too, especially in colder regions.

Description

The sugar beet has a white, cone-shaped root (a taproot) with a flat top. It also has a circle of leaves. Sugar is made by photosynthesis in the leaves and stored in the root.

The root of the beet contains 75% water, about 20% sugar, and 5% pulp. The sugar in sugar beets can range from 12% to 21%, depending on the type of plant and how it is grown. Sugar is the main reason people grow sugar beets as a cash crop. The pulp, which does not dissolve in water and is mostly made of cellulose, hemicellulose, lignin, and pectin, is used to feed animals. Other parts of the sugar beet crop, like pulp and molasses, add more value to the harvest.

Sugar beets grow only in temperate areas, unlike sugarcane, which grows in tropical and subtropical zones. A sugar beet usually weighs between 0.5 and 1 kg (1.1 and 2.2 lb). The leaves of the sugar beet are rich green and grow to about 35 cm (14 in) tall. The leaves grow in a cluster from the top of the beet, which is often at or just above the ground.

History

Discovery

Main article: Beta vulgaris

The beet plant has many types. In the 1500s, a French scientist named Olivier de Serres found a way to make syrup from red beetroot. But because sugar from sugar cane tasted better, this idea didn’t become popular.

Modern sugar beets started in the 1700s in Silesia. The king of Prussia, Frederick the Great, helped scientists try to make sugar from beets. In 1747, a scientist named Andreas Sigismund Marggraf found sugar in beetroots. He showed that this sugar was the same as sugar from sugar cane. But his work didn’t lead to making sugar from beets for sale.

Development of the sugar beet

Franz Karl Achard, a student of Marggraf, began growing sugar beets in Kaulsdorf near Berlin in 1786. He tested many types of beets and picked one from Halberstadt in today’s Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. This beet was named weiße schlesische Zuckerrübe, meaning white Silesian sugar beet. Around 1800, it had about 5% to 6% sugar. This beet became the basis for all modern sugar beets. Since then, scientists have kept improving them.

Beet sugar industry

Main article: Beet sugar factory

In 1801, Franz Karl Achard opened the world’s first factory to make sugar from beets in Kunern, Silesia (now in Poland). Soon, people in France began making sugar from beets too. By 1840, about 5% of the world’s sugar came from beets. By 1880, that number grew to over 50%. In North America, the first factory opened in 1879 in Alvarado, California. German settlers brought sugar beets to Chile around 1850.

Culture

The sugar beet, like sugarcane, needs special soil and climate to grow well. The soil should have lots of nutrients, be rich in humus, and hold moisture. It should also be fairly level and drain well, especially where irrigation is used.

Sugar beets grow best in sandy loam soil—a mix of organic matter, clay, and sand. They can grow in sandy soil or heavy loams, but not in soil with gravel or hardpan. The best temperatures for sugar beets are between 15 to 21 °C (59 to 70 °F). They need about 460 mm (18 inches) of rain if there is no irrigation. The best places to grow sugar beets are along the coast of southern California, where warm days and cool nights help them grow. In places like Idaho, Colorado, and Utah, the high daytime temperatures and cool nights also produce excellent sugar beets. In Michigan, long summer days and the influence of the Great Lakes create good conditions for sugar beets.

Production

In 2024, the world made 294 million tonnes of sugar beets. The biggest makers were Russia and Germany.

Sugar extraction

Most sugar beets are used to make white sugar. This happens in a place called a beet sugar factory, sometimes just called a sugar factory. These factories clean and finish the sugar.

In the 1960s, making sugar from beets had these steps:

• Harvesting and storing the beets carefully
• Washing and cleaning them to remove dirt
• Cutting the beets into small pieces
• Taking the sugar out, leaving behind beet pulp

Now, most factories clean the sugar themselves. The beet pulp is used to make food for cattle.

The steps to turn this into white sugar are the same whether you start with sugar beets or sugar cane:

• Cleaning the juice to take out impurities
• Heating the juice to make it thicker
• Turning the juice into sugar crystals by boiling it
• Separating the crystals from the liquid in a machine called a centrifuge
• Boiling the leftover liquid to get more sugar and a thick, sweet syrup called molasses

Ethanol production

From molasses

There are two ways to make alcohol called ethanol from sugar beets. One way makes alcohol as a side product when making sugar. This is done by fermenting the sugar beet molasses left after cleaning the sugar. This process is similar to how rum is made from sugar cane molasses. In some countries, like the Czech Republic and Slovakia, this method is used to make a rum-like drink called Tuzemak. On the Åland Islands, a similar drink is made called Kobba Libre.

From sugar beet

The second way to make alcohol is by directly fermenting sugar beets without first turning them into sugar. This method started soon after the first sugar beet factory was built. Between 1852 and 1854, a person named Champonnois found a good way to make alcohol from sugar beets. Soon after, many factories to make alcohol from sugar beets appeared in France. Today, the steps to make alcohol from sugar beets are:

• Adding Starch milk
• Liquefaction and Saccharification
• Fermentation in special vats
• Distillation
• Dehydration, which makes Bioethanol
• Rectification
• Refining, which makes a very pure alcohol

Large factories that make alcohol from sugar beets are mostly found in Europe. In 2023, a company called Tereos had 8 such factories in France, Czechia, and Romania.

In many European countries, the clean alcohol made from sugar beets is used to produce drinks like vodka, Gin, and others.

Other uses

Sugary syrup

You can make a thick, dark syrup from sugar beet. This syrup is made by cooking shredded sugar beet for several hours, then pressing the mash and concentrating the juice until it looks like honey. No other ingredients are used.

In Germany, especially in the Rhineland, and in the Netherlands, this syrup (called Zuckerrüben-Sirup or Zapp in German, or Suikerstroop in Dutch) is used on sandwiches and to sweeten sauces, cakes, and desserts. Dutch people often put it on top of their pancakes.

Uridine

Uridine can be taken from sugar beet.

Alternative fuel

BP and Associated British Foods plan to use extra sugar beet to make biobutanol in East Anglia in the United Kingdom.

Cattle feed

In New Zealand, sugar beet is grown to feed dairy cows. It is better than fodder beet because it has less water, which helps with storage. Both the beet and the leaves (with 25% protein) are fed to cows. Dairy cows in New Zealand can live on just grass and beets, without silage or other extra food. The crop is also grown in some parts of Australia for cattle feed.

Agriculture

Sugar beets are an important part of a crop rotation cycle.

Sugar beet plants can get sick from Rhizomania, which changes the big root. Rules in European countries try to stop it from spreading.

Scientists are always looking for new types of sugar beets that can resist these sicknesses. In the United States, important research happens at different USDA farms, such as in Fort Collins, Colorado, Fargo, North Dakota, and Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan.

Other important plants in the same family include:

• Beetroot
• Chard
• Mangelwurzel or fodder beet

Genetic modification

Main article: Genetically modified sugar beet

In the United States, scientists created genetically modified sugar beets. Sugar from these modified beets is safe to eat. Most sugar beet farms in the U.S. used these modified beets by 2011.

Farmers can spray glyphosate to kill weeds without hurting the sugar beet plants. However, some people had worries about these modified beets.

Genome and genetics

Scientists have studied the DNA of sugar beets. The DNA is very small, about 731 Megabases, and is spread out over 18 tiny parts called chromosomes. Most of the DNA is made of pieces that repeat.

Scientists also studied wild beet plants. They found a gene that helps protect sugar beets from a disease called rhizomania, which can hurt the plants.

satellite DNA LTR retrotransposons

Breeding

Sugar beets have been grown to have more sugar. They now have 18% sugar, up from 8% 200 years ago. They are also bred to resist diseases and to grow bigger roots. Scientists found a special line that helps make breeding easier and grows more sugar beets.