Florida Sugar Industry

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Florida Sugar Industry

• Marie Crane
• Emission Factor Documentation For AP-42 sec.
  9.10.1.1Sugar Cane Processing Final Report
• 1997

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Brief History

• Sugarcane is a tropical grass, native to Asia
• Manufacture and processing of sugarcane to raw
  sugar developed in India around 400BC
• Columbus and other Europeans brought sugarcane to
  W. Indies where it was grown on sugar plantations

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Florida Sugarcane

• FL Sugar is primarily grown on the Southern and
  Eastern shores of Lake Okeechobee
• Palm Beach County 70 sugar farming
• Hendry, Glades, Martin Counties account for
  the other 30

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• Sugar cane is grown in the Everglades because its
  soil is rich in Nitrogen, and the area gets lots
  of water and sunshine
• Problems in this area include
• Labor costs
• Lower sugar content

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Planting

• Sugar cane is typically planted between late
  August and January
• Fields are replanted every 2-4 years
• -usually 3 annual crops
• In 2000 454,400 acres (184,030hectares) were
  planted
• 436,100 acres were harvested, and the remaining
  crop was used as seed for replanting

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Harvesting Sugarcane

• Sugarcane is harvested from late October through
  March
• Fields are burned before harvest to remove excess
  plant material and make harvesting the crops
  easier

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Harvesting Ctd

• While much of the world harvests sugarcane by
  hand Florida, Louisana, Texas and Hawaii all now
  use mechanical harvesters
• Sugar Beets are also grown in some states, but
  the U.S still imports about 1/5th of its sugar
  from around the world
• 1998 55.7 US cane sugar, 22 beet sugar

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Production and Refinement

• Sugar is then transported to one of South
  Floridas 6 Sugar mills
• By-products include
• Bagasse-stalk fiber
• Filtercake
• Molasses
• Blackstrap
• Edible

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Continued
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Refineries

• There are 2 refineries in South Florida that take
  raw sugar to produce
• Granulated sugar
• Liquid sugar

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Emission Factors

• An emission factor is a representative value that
  attempts to relate the quantity of a pollutant
  released to the atmosphere with an activity
  associated with the release of that pollutant
• Usually expresses as Weight of pollutant divided
  by unit weight, volume, distance, or duration of
  activity that emits pollutant

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Emissions Ctd

• PM (particulate matter), CP (combustion products)
  and VOC (volatile organic compounds) are the
  primary pollutants emitted from sugarcane
  processing
• CP include Nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, and
  sulfur oxides
• Mills have taken steps to reduce potentially
  harmful emissions

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Organizations

• Some groups associated with Fl sugarcane industry
  include
• USDAs Sugarcane field station at Canal Point
• UFL Everglades Research and Education at Belle
  Glade
• The Florida Sugarcane League
• US Sugar Corp
• FL Crystals Corp.
• Sugarcane Cooperative of Florida

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Works Consulted

• http//florida-agriculture.com
• http//edis.ifas.ufl.edu/sc032
• http//www.epa.gov/ttn/chief/ap42/ch09/bgdocs/b9s1
  0-1a.pdf