A Troublesome Factory. Regulating the “Industrial Overflow” of a Norman Sugar Plant As Production Intensified in the 20th Century

The sugar industry in mainland France expanded significantly in the second half of the 19th century and became highly concentrated in the 20th century, when the number of beet sugar factories was divided by ten, while total sugar production increased fivefold, albeit with high social and environmental costs. This article looks at the regulation of ‘industrial overflow’ from a sugar factory in a village in the Seine-Maritime département of Normandy, combining a material history of the accumulation of hazardous products with a history of awareness about nuisance and pollution. Through an analysis of archives and interviews with local councillors and former employees, we show how this awareness spread to the general public, beginning with the first warnings from experts and complaints from local residents in the 1970s, and leading up to workers’ struggles to have their occupational illnesses recognised when the factory closed in 2003. This approach uses local surveys over the long term in order to decompartmentalise the issues of environmental health and workplace health.