Section: CRUNS Market & Features

Although it has been a major exporter of urea, increasing Chinese government restrictions have restricted the seasonal window for exports.

Anton Kariagin and Stefan Gebert of Clariant discuss the benefits and commercial performance of the new low temperature shift (LTS) catalyst – ShiftMax 217 Plus. A case study demonstrates the benefits of this catalyst, providing ultra-low methanol formation resulting in increased ammonia production and/or energy savings.

Johnson Matthey's latest KATALCO™ 71-7F high temperature shift catalyst with its robust shape provides lower lifetime pressure drop.

Ammonia has been recognised as an advantageous hydrogen and energy carrier. This article focuses on the use of ammonia as fuel in steam reformers and ammonia crackers in order to reduce or completely eliminate direct CO2 emissions. Ammonia combustion knowledge is especially important for ammonia crackers with respect to the recycling of unconverted ammonia. Air Liquide is constructing an industrial scale pilot plant in Antwerp, planned to be operational in 2024, that will be used to demonstrate ammonia cracking and combustion in a process furnace with a multiple burner configuration.

Prices in the West are unlikely to garner much support moving into the latter stages of Q2. The May Tampa ammonia settlement was settled by Yara and Mosaic at $450/t c.fr, down $25/t on the $475/t c.fr agreed for April. With seasonal domestic demand in the US drawing to a close 2H April, many had anticipated that either a rollover or a slight decline would be agreed.

Nitrogen+Syngas’s annual listing of new ammonia, urea, nitric acid and ammonium nitrate plants.

Prices will remain stable-to-soft across the board, though benchmarks could remain slightly more supported in the short-term than previously thought, with more significant declines likely in Q2-Q3.

Ammonia pricing in the US Mid-West stood at $625/st f.o.b. in February, with applications to field continuing to ramp up. Prices in the US Gulf remain pegged in the low-to-mid$400s/t f.o.b. Recent production outages in the region have largely subsided, though an unexpectedly early uptick in seasonal demand from local buyers is likely to provide a degree of price support moving forward. The Tampa ammonia settlement for March has been settled by Yara and Mosaic at a $445/t c.fr rollover, largely in line with market expectations. The North American market remains detached from the considerably more oversupplied global ammonia scene.

A summary of papers presented at CRU’s Nitrogen+Syngas conference, this year held at the Gothia Towers in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Christof Group SBN presents groundbreaking sensor technology for accurate and reliable continuous monitoring of individual heat exchanger tube wall thickness in high pressure, high temperature industrial conditions.