The closure of CF Industries’ ammonia plant at Billingham, Teesside (see Industry News, page 8) marks the end of a long era for UK fertilizer manufacture. The facility was the last operating ammonia plant in the country, following CF’s decision to permanently close its site at Ince in Cheshire in June last year. Going forward, Billingham will now rely on imported ammonia as a feedstock to run the nitric acid and 625,000 t/a ammonium nitrate plants on the site.
Large-scale ammonia cracking for conversion of ammonia to hydrogen is a proven technology with decades of industrial experience. Topsoe shares its experience within ammonia cracking and presents an improved and highly energy-efficient (96%) ammonia cracking technology, H2Retake™ , developed based on Topsoe’s proven technology and industrial experience.
With the growing global demand for food and the rise in ecological challenges, there’s a pressing need for a more sustainable and environmentally-friendly approach to fertilizer production. Achieving a sustainable increase in plant load and operational margins through improved operations is a demanding task. Luc Dieltjens and Ali El Sibai of Stamicarbon discuss how a plant can effectively address these challenges with digital tools to optimise the process.
Venkat Pattabathula , a member of the AIChE Ammonia Safety Committee, reports on the American Institute of Chemical Engineers’ Safety in Ammonia Plants and Related Facilities Symposium, held in Munich, Germany, from 20-24 August 2023.
Prior to the covid pandemic, sub-Saharan Africa had been the fastest growing market for new fertilizer demand. However, the combination of pandemic related disruption, followed by the dislocations caused by the war in Ukraine, have pushed up prices and led to falling demand across the continent.
Ammonia prices have now dropped by about 50% from their highs a year ago. Gas prices have fallen, particularly in Europe, and peak fertilizer application season is over in Europe and North America, leading to slackening demand., leading to slackening demand.
Norwegian chemical shipping company Stolt-Nielsen says that Niels G. Stolt-Nielsen will step down from his role as CEO on September 1, 2023, after 23 years as Chief Executive Officer. He will be succeeded as CEO by Udo Lange and will assume the role of Chairman of the Board of Stolt-Nielsen Ltd, the company announced. Lange has more than 20 years of experience in the international trade industry, with expertise in freight forwarding, express and parcel logistics and airline catering. He was most recently president of Healthcare, Logistics and Americas International at FedEx Express, leading a team of more than 50,000 employees across 80 countries. He was also part of the FedEx Senior Management Committee which sets the strategic direction of the circa $90 billion revenue enterprise and has held several other senior roles at FedEx since joining in 2015.
Plant digitalisation can contribute to increase the profitability of chemical plants by optimising performance of operation as well as maintenance. Available digital products range from visualisation of plant data for increased transparency to closed-loop AI controllers based on digital twins.
Rohit Khurana and Umesh Jainker of KBR presented a technical paper on this topic during the 2013 Asian Nitrogen + Syngas Conference. It can be found in the UreaKnowHow.com E-Library with the title: ”Replacing ammonia plant catalyst with maximum efficiency and lowest cost”. The paper addresses the importance of de-dusting catalyst beds before commissioning and the serious impacts on the plant if not performed thoroughly. Many ammonia plants have faced problems related to the plugging of exchangers, pipe choking, pressure drop increase of the downstream catalyst beds and separators or foaming in the CO 2 removal section which could be caused by the presence of catalyst dust. Most of these problems have led to either decrease in the efficiency of the plant or operation at lower throughputs. The paper presents the critical steps and procedures for proper dedusting of the catalyst beds before commissioning. In addition, the foaming problem in the CO 2 removal section associated with catalyst dust is discussed signifying the importance of cleaning the CO 2 removal system and solution. The role of filters in the CO 2 removal section was also emphasised.