Sugar production begins at Imperial plant

PORT WENTWORTH, GA (WTOC) - Imperial Sugar is on its way to becoming completely operational.

Tuesday, the sugar refinery in Port Wentworth began making granulated sugar for the first time in over a year. An explosion destroyed much of the plant on February 7, 2008, killing 14 people and injuring dozens more.

In the past year and a half, Imperial Sugar has been working to rebuild the plant and has slowly opened sections of the plant as those projects were completed.

Tuesday's official restart of the refinery is another major milestone for the company.

"In 10 days from now, industrial customers will receive the first granulated sugar shipments from our new facilities," said Imperial Sugar CEO John Sheptor. "Today we begin production in the safest sugar factory in the world utilizing many new technologies for the first time in the sugar industry."

The refinery expects to start shipping liquid sugar by Thursday. The packaging plant is scheduled to reopen in the fall.