Category: Asia

Rapidly escalating natural gas prices forced plant closures across Europe during September. Worst affected was the UK, where a fire at a cross-Channel electricity cable and low output from wind energy has, combined with low domestic storage capacity led to a surge in demand for gas for power stations and wholesale gas prices reached a record 350 pence per therm (equivalent to $46/ MMBtu) in October. On September 15th, CF Industries announced that it was halting operations at both its Billingham and Ince fertilizer plans due to high gas prices. Although ammonia prices have also risen, they have not kept pace with gas price rises, and there is a limit to what farmers could be expected to pay. CF CEO Anthony Will said: “$900 is the gas cost in a tonne of ammonia and the last trade in the ammonia market that was done was $700 a tonne”. As these plants supply most of the UK’s carbon dioxide for food and drink manufacture, the government said it would provide “limited financial support” to keep the Billingham plant operational, and that plant re-started on September 21st. Meanwhile, BASF closed its Antwerp and Ludwigshafen plants in Belgium and Germany due to what the company called “extremely challenging” economics. Fertiberia ceased production at its Palos de la Frontera site in Spain, and Puertellano remained down for scheduled maintenance. Yara shut 40% of its European ammonia production in September, and OCI partially closed its Geleen plant in the Netherlands. Achema in Lithuania decided against restarting its ammonia plant following maintenance in August, and OPZ in Ukraine shut one ammonia line at Odessa, with Ostchem and DniproAzot likely to follow. Borealis in Austria also reduced production.

China’s private sector Shenghong Petrochemical refining complex is targeting a startup in late November, following the receipt of its first cargo of crude in October. The greenfield refining complex in the eastern Lianyungang petrochemical zone has a capacity of 16 million t/a, including a 320,000 bbl/d crude unit – the largest single stream CDU in China – and a 76,000 bbl/d naphtha reformer. Product capacities include 56,000 bbl/d of gasoline, 41,000 bbl/d of diesel and 32,000 bbl/d of jet fuel. Construction began in mid-2019, delayed from 2018 by late approval of its environmental impact assessment, but has been achieved within two months of the scheduled completion date in spite of the coronavirus pandemic. Shenghong Petrochemical is owned by Eastern Shenghong, a producer of petrochemical products and chemical fibres.

Lithium-boron miner ioneer Ltd has awarded DuPont Clean Technologies a contract for the license, engineering, and supply of proprietary equipment for a planned sulphuric acid plant at the company’s Rhyolite Ridge project in Nevada. DuPont will work with engineering partner SNC-Lavalin on the plant design, using MECS® sulphuric acid technology for the 3,500 t/d sulphur-burning unit, as well as controls that limit emissions to among the lowest in the world for this type of facility. DuPont will also supply its latest generation MECSSuper GEAR® ™ catalyst and other critical proprietary equipment. The contract is conditional on a final investment decision by the ioneer board of directors.

The UK has published its Hydrogen Strategy, setting out the government’s ambition to create a low carbon hydrogen sector, with up to one third of the UK’s energy consumption being hydrogen-based by 2050. The commitments set out in the strategy unlocks £4 billion of government investment by 2030. The government plans 5GW of low carbon hydrogen production capacity and the establishment of carbon capture, use and storage (CCUS) in four industrial clusters by 2030, as well as blending of hydrogen into the existing gas network and a ‘twin-track’ approach to hydrogen production, using both electrolytic and CCUS-enabled low carbon hydrogen production in order to scale up production in time to meet the UK’s 2030 and 2050 carbon emissions targets.

India’s power and renewable energy minister RK Singh has placed draft plans before the cabinet for the country’s refining and fertilizer sectors to switch to renewable ‘green’ hydrogen feeds. Other energy intensive sectors such as steel and transport are likely to follow. The policy suggests that refiners must have 10% of their hydrogen consumption generated from renewable electricity by the end of financial year 2023-24, rising to 25% by 2030. The comparable figures for ammonia/urea production are 5% and 20%, respectively. India is pursuing some of the world’s most ambitious renewable energy targets of 175 GW of renewable energy capacity by the end of 2022 and 450 GW by 2030.

China is the world’s largest importer of sulphur, mainly to feed domestic phosphate production. Sour gas in Sichuan and new refinery production, coupled with rationalisation in the phosphate sector are all leading to reduced imports, while new smelters are increasing sulphuric acid production and reducing the need for pyrite-based and sulphur burning acid production.

INEOS Enterprises has announced the completion of the sale of its Sulphur Chemicals business to International Chemical Investors Group, for an undisclosed sum. INEOS Sulphur Chemicals business is Spain’s largest dedicated manufacturer of sulphuric acid and oleum, serving clients in both agriculture and chemical intermediates via its 400,000 t/a plant in Bilbao. The business will become part of WeylChem’s advanced intermediates and reagents portfolio, which includes an existing sulphuric acid and oleum plant located in Lamotte, northern France. WeylChem is wholly owned by the International Chemical Investors Group (ICIG).

A consortium has unveiled plans to build one of the largest green hydrogen plants in the world in a bid to make Oman a leader in renewable energy technology. The $30 billion project is being developed by Oman’s state-owned oil firm OQ, green fuels developer InterContinental Energy and Kuwait government-backed renewables investor EnerTech. Construction is scheduled to start in 2028 in Al Wusta governorate on the Arabian Sea. It will be built in stages, with the aim to be at full capacity by 2038, powered by 25 GW of wind and solar energy. Two years has already been spent on solar and wind monitoring analysis for the development. According to the consortium, the site chosen has the optimal diurnal profile of strong wind at night and reliable sun during the day, and is also located near the coast for seawater intake and electrolysis.

Maire Tecnimont SpA says that its subsidiaries MET Development, Stamicarbon and NextChem have collectively begun work on a renewable power-to-fertilizer plant in Kenya. MET Development has signed an agreement with Oserian Development Company for the development of the plant at the Oserian Two lakes Industrial Park, on the southern banks of Lake Naivasha, 100 km north of Nairobi.

Production has begun at Ivanhoe Mines’ Kakula copper mine in the DRC. The company says that total production for this year is expected to be 80-95,000 t/a of copper in concentrate, with a phase two expansion to 400,000 t/a due to be completed by Q2 2022. Ivanhoe is working with China’s Zijin Mining on the development plan for phases 2 and 3 of the mine, as well as a feasibility study for the Kipushi zinc mine further to the east. Both projects lie close to the DRC’s southern border, with Angola and Zambia respectively. Phase 3 of Kamoa will lift capacity to an anticipated 600-800,000 t/a of copper in concentrate, making it the second largest copper mine in the world after Escondida in Chile. Canadian-based Ivanhoe expects to be digging 3.8 million t/a of ore at Kakula with 6% copper content in Phase 1.