Prime Minister Narendra Modi laid a foundation stone for a new ammonia-urea plant at Namrup in Assam on December 21st. The plant, to be constructed by the Assam Valley Fertiliser and Chemical Company Ltd (AVFCCL), will have a urea production capacity of 1.27 million t/a, and the project is scheduled for commissioning in 2030.
Prayon has officially opened a new sodium hexametaphosphate (SHMP) production unit at its Engis complex in Belgium. The €30 million investment is designed to strengthen the company’s position in the food and technical phosphates market.
The African Development Bank has approved a $10 million loan to Hyphen Hydrogen Energy, a Namibian green hydrogen development company, to support a green ammonia project valued at more than $10 billion, and with the potential to position Namibia as a pioneer in the global green hydrogen economy. The loan, sourced from the Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa (SEFA), will support frontend engineering design (FEED) studies for solar and wind generation, battery energy storage systems, and electrolyser capacity and desalination infrastructure, aiming to de-risk the project and attract the financing required for its realisation.
Barents Blue AS has announced Proton Ventures as a new partner in the Barents Clean Ammonia Project (project formerly known as the Barents Blue project). Barents Blue says that the Dutch engineering and project development company, a pioneer in the clean ammonia industry, “will bring significant resources and industry expertise to the project and the value chain for clean ammonia, important for the realisation of Europe’s largest clean ammonia production plant located in Finnmark, Northern Norway”.
Uralchem JSC and three Indian fertiliser companies; Rashtriya Chemicals and Fertilizers Ltd (RCF), National Fertilizers Ltd (NFL), and Indian Potash Ltd (IPL) have signed a memorandum of understanding to set up a joint venture to construct a urea plant in Russia. The signing ceremony was held in New Delhi in December during a state visit by Russian president Vladimir Putin to India.
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries says that it has succeeded in producing 99% pure hydrogen by cracking ammonia using steam as the heating source. The production of hydrogen at pilot scale using the steam heating was conducted at the company’s pilot plant in the Nagasaki District Research & Innovation Centre, marking a world first. By contrast to technologies that use heat from burner combustion, MHI’s steam heating system operates at lower reaction temperatures, reducing operating costs. In addition, because a combustion furnace is not required, the system offers excellent features such as the potential for miniaturisation.
Oman’s Ministry of Transport, Communications and Information Technology has signed a memorandum of understanding with a consortium comprising HIF EMEA GmbH, Acciona Nordex Green Hydrogen and Al Meera Investments to jointly explore the development of a low carbon methanol supply and bunkering hub at Dhofar in Oman. This strategic collaboration aligns with Oman’s Vision 2040 strategy, supporting national decarbonisation targets and positioning Oman as a pre-eminent green maritime and bunkering hub in the Middle East.
NextChem, via its nitrogen technology licensor Stamicarbon, has been awarded a licensing, process design package (PDP), and proprietary equipment supply contract based on its proprietary NX STAMI Urea™ technology, for a new urea plant in Eastern China by what NextChem describes as “a prominent fertilizer producer”.
The first 320 MW phase of what China Energy Engineering Corporation Ltd says will ultimately become the world’s largest integrated green hydrogen-ammonia-methanol project HyFlow has officially begun operation in Songyuan City in Jilin Province. With a total investment of nearly $4.30 billion, the Songyuan project uses a “wind-solarhydrogen-ammonia-methanol” integration model, creating an industrial chain that includes hydrogen production and storage, as well as hydrogen-derived chemicals such as ammonia and methanol, hydrogen energy equipment, and scientific research. The project eventually plans to develop 3 GW of renewable energy capacity from wind and solar power, alongside a target production capacity of 800,000 t/a of green ammonia and methanol. The annual production of green hydrogen in the project’s first phase is expected to be equivalent to approximately one-fifth of China’s current total annual green hydrogen production.
A consortium consisting of TotalEnergies, Osaka Gas, Toho Gas, and ITOCHU have signed a joint development and operating agreement, granting the Japanese companies a combined 33.3% stake in the Live Oak project – a large-scale facility to produce renewable synthetic natural gas, also referred to as e-NG or e-methane, initiated by TES and TotalEnergies and currently under development in Nebraska. Following the agreement, TES and TotalEnergies will each maintain a 33.35 % stake in the project.