In the five German plants of Pfeifer & Langen, the peak phase of the beet campaign is currently underway, i.e. the time when the farmers deliver their harvested beets, which are then processed into sugar in the factories of the Cologne-based family company.

That means high activity.

"Our top priority is that the factories run 24/7 during the beet campaign, because the beets cannot be stored for long," says Michael Schaupp, one of the three managing directors of Pfeifer & Langen and, among other things, responsible for the production of the sugar manufacturer.

“We cannot afford to turn the factory on and off again.

Otherwise there would be major problems with the logistics chain because the beets would have to be transported to other plants.”

Jonas Jansen

Business correspondent in Düsseldorf.

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At the beginning of September, the Federal Cartel Office allowed the four sugar companies producing in Germany, Nordzucker, Südzucker, Pfeifer & Langen and Cosun Beet, to work together more closely than they had for a long time in the event of a gas supply emergency.

Specifically, they are allowed to make production capacities available to each other this year in order to ensure the processing of the sugar beets.

But at the moment it looks like they don't need it.

In the production of sugar, "process steam" is required above all, which is why it is considered energy-intensive.

First, the beets are cleaned and crushed in order to extract raw juice from them.

Subsequent purification, evaporation and crystallization then produces sugar.

Two blue sugar loafs in the logo

With an annual turnover of around 975 million euros, Pfeifer & Langen is significantly smaller than the giant Südzucker, the Diamant-Zucker with the two blue sugar loafs as a logo, which is based on the Cologne Cathedral at home, is nevertheless well known to most supermarket customers.

In the most important months of the year this season, the focus is primarily on factories that still run purely on gas.

"In Jülich, for example, we are expanding the system next year so that we can also use heating oil in addition to natural gas, thereby reducing the risk of failure," says Schaupp.

“That takes place after the beet campaign.

This year we started the campaign earlier so that our risk of a gas shortage is reduced backwards.” Because even if the fill levels in the gas storage tanks still look promising at the moment,

As a further emergency measure at the Appeldorn site, a factory previously operated with gas was converted to heavy fuel oil.

This was also possible because the permit for the old system was still valid, so it could be switched over quickly.

According to the company, this means that it can save a good half of its gas requirements compared to the previous year.

“These are measures that do not contribute to our plan towards carbon neutrality for the moment.

But they are currently unavoidable in order to secure operations," says Schaupp.

The distribution of the energy supply over several sustainable carriers should ensure in the medium term that such quick actions as now will no longer be needed in the future.