By ROBIN SHANNON

Staff Reporter

RESERVE – After extensive delays that have lasted more than two years, government and industry officials broke ground Tuesday on a $160 million sugar refinery in St. John Parish, a project that is expected to be the largest sugar refining facility in the United States.

The new refinery is a joint venture between Cargill Inc. and Sugar Growers and Refiners Inc. (SUGAR), which is an agricultural cooperative of about 700 growers in South Louisiana, who are now stakeholders in the facility. It is expected to handle a million tons of raw sugar cane per year.

Cargill officials said the refinery would be responsible for 75 percent of all raw sugar produced in Louisiana, and 10 percent of the nation’s sugar. It is expected to create about 125 permanent jobs for the region, along with countless construction related employment opportunities. St. John officials said the refinery is estimated to generate $500 million in total revenue. Parish Spokesman Buddy Boe said there would be a bump in property tax revenue, but figures were not available at press time.

“This is a sweet project,” said St. John Parish President Bill Hubbard. “It’s just one more example of the opportunities in the River Region, especially in St. John Parish.”

The refinery project suffered through numerous delays before reaching Tuesday’s groundbreaking festivities. Cargill initially

announced its intention to build the refinery, to be located next to the company’s Reserve grain elevator, back in November 2005, but the company needed assurances that a water treatment plant near the facility would receive improvements. A $1 million grant to go toward expansion of the Lions treatment plant, to make it more suitable for the plant’s everyday operations, was secured in late January.

Boe said the improvements to the water plant will add approximately 1.2 million gallons of water per day, with only 600,000 gallons being used by the refinery. He said total cost of the upgrade is estimated at $3 million, with Cargill supplying about $1.5 million of the funding. In addition to the $1 million grant, Boe said the remaining $500,000 would come from the parish.

The project hit another snag in November in 2007 when $100 million in Gulf Opportunity Zone bonds was lost after the State Bond Commission reversed its decision to fund the project. A second request was filed in February 2008, which eventually received approval.

Bill Brady, a spokesman for Cargill, also attributed the delay to the extensive size of the two major entities involved in the project. He said it was a painstaking process to ensure everyone was on the same page.

In a speech to the crowd that gathered Tuesday, Cargill’s corn milling operations President Alan Willits made light of the long wait, but said it should be smooth sailing from here on out.

“You might say that the alliance between Cargill and SUGAR is like andouille in that it took some time to get the ingredients right, but it sure is good now that it is ready,” said Willits to the crowd. “The cane growers of this region have a 200-year heritage in growing and milling sugar cane, but to fully participate in this industry they need to take it one step further into refining finished products and marketing them to food customers.”

Brady said in building this new facility, sugar cane growers in Louisiana will, for the first time, gain an interest in the refining operations of their product because of the 50-50 ownership of the refinery. He also touted the advantages of the Reserve location.

“A location close to the Mississippi River is critical for our operations,” said Brady. “We also saw some benefits in the close proximity of Cargill’s grain operations, since key infrastructure is already in place.”

The Cargill refinery, which is slated for completion in 2010, will be the third sugar producing facility in all of Louisiana. The state is second  in the nation behind Florida when it comes to sugar production. The sugar refinery will be the first in St. John Parish since the Godchaux-Henderson refinery, which shut down operations in Reserve in 1987.