The owners of the factory leased the line, and built another 8 miles (13 km) of track, which ensured that sugar beet could reach the plant in sufficient volume to make it efficient.
The Ministry of Agriculture deemed that the factory was of strategic importance during World War II, and took responsibility for it from March 1941.
They drafted in Italian prisoners of war to refurbish the railway, and to construct the first roads to the factory.
Final closure came in 1982 when improvements to the line (by this point operation was between Denver near Downham Market and Wissington) were required.
In 2007, Wissington was the site of the UK's first bioethanol power plant, the excess heat from which was used to heat on-site greenhouses that produced 70 million tomatoes each year; in 2017, the greenhouses switched to producing cannabis plants for medicine production.