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Category: Latin America

BioConsortia – the uniquely positive biologicals company

California-based biologicals company BioConsortia is launching the nitrogen-fixing product Always N for 2025 season sales in New Zealand with its partner Mosaic. The product, which is based on robust, spore-forming, gram-positive microbes (Paenibacillus ) fixes atmospheric nitrogen throughout the growing season by colonising the roots of corn, wheat and potatoes, as well as fruits and vegetables. Always N delivers consistent yield gains and is backed by data from more than 300 trials in Brazil, New Zealand, the US and Europe. Fertilizer International spoke with Marcus Meadows-Smith, the company’s CEO, ahead of the Fertilizer Latino Americano 2025 conference.

Nitrogen Industry News Roundup

OCI Global says that it has reached an agreement for the sale of 100% of its equity interests in its Clean Ammonia project currently under construction in Beaumont, Texas for $2.35 billion on a cash and debt free basis. The buyer is Australian LNG and energy company Woodside Energy Group Ltd. Woodside will pay 80% of the purchase price to OCI at closing of the transaction, with the balance payable at project completion, according to agreed terms and conditions. OCI will continue to manage the construction, commissioning and startup of the facility and will continue to direct the contractors until the project is fully staffed and operational, at which point it will hand it over to Woodside. The transaction is expected to close in H2 2024, subject to shareholder approval.

Sulphur Industry News Roundup

Shell Deutschland has taken a final investment decision (FID) to progress REFHYNE II, a 100 MW renewable proton-exchange membrane (PEM) hydrogen electrolyser at the Shell Energy and Chemicals Park Rheinland in Germany. Using renewable electricity, REFHYNE II is expected to produce up to 44 t/d of renewable hydrogen to partially decarbonise site operations. The electrolyser is scheduled to begin operating in 2027. Renewable hydrogen from REFHYNE II will be used at the Shell Energy and Chemicals Park to produce energy products such as transport fuels with a lower carbon intensity. Using renewable hydrogen at Shell Rheinland will help to further reduce Scope 1 and 2 emissions at the facility. In the longer term, renewable hydrogen from REFHYNE II could be directly supplied to help lower industrial emissions in the region as customer demand evolves.