North America’s sulphur industry
Sulphur output in North America continues to decline due to refinery closures and conversions at the same time that acid demand is increasing for metals processing projects.
Tag: United States
Copper output begins at Rio Tinto-backed project
Gunnison has started producing pure copper cathodes at its Johnson Camp Mine (JCM) in southeast Arizona, United States, from a solvent extraction-electrowinning (SX-EW) circuit and using leaching technology from Rio Tinto-owned Nuton. As well as giving Gunnison exclusive rights to deploy the proprietary process on run-of-mine ore, Nuton is a financial partner of the Phoenix-headquartered mine developer which has restarted copper production at past-producing JCM. The company’s next goal is to ramp-up to nameplate plant capacity of 25 million lbs/year (11,300 t/a) of finished copper.
Linde to build ASU for blue ammonia project
Linda has signed a new long-term agreement with Blue Point Number One, a joint venture between CF Industries, JERA and Mitsui. Under the terms of the agreement, Linde will supply industrial gases to Blue Point’s 1.4 million t/a low carbon ammonia plant in Ascension Parish, Louisiana. Linde will build, own and operate a world-scale air […]
NOx release at Austin Powder
There has been a release of nitrogen oxides from Austin Powder’s Red Diamond plant in Ohio. The company says that the decomposition of nitric acid caused the incident due to elevated temperatures inside a 5,000-gallon storage tank. This led to a visible release of nitrogen oxide gas, which was vented through the plant’s built-in safety […]
Resilient demand versus historically bad affordability
In this CRU Insight, Anthony Rizzo explains why market participants should expect an uneven global demand picture in 2026 and highlights regional variations.
US tariff pause brings relief to fertilizer exporters
President Donald Trump delayed his ‘liberation day” tariffs by three months on 9th April, while simultaneously ramping up levies on China.
US tariff pause brings relief to fertilizer exporters
President Donald Trump delayed his ‘liberation day” tariffs by three months on 9th April, while simultaneously ramping up levies on China. In this latest twist to the on-off US tariffs saga, the Trump administration’s 90-day pause on additional duties should provide international suppliers to the world’s biggest fertilizer market with some respite – for now. With the exception of China, the US will now cut back its so-called ‘reciprocal tariffs’ to 10% for the duration of a three-month suspension period. The European Union’s tariff is now halved to 10%, for example, with the trade bloc also pausing its trade countermeasures against the US.
The impact of US tariffs
While the US tariff situation remains subject to considerable uncertainty, there has already been an impact on short term trade flows, as well as investment decisions.
Cornerstone sells sulphuric acid operations
Cornerstone Chemical Company has sold its sulphuric acid operations to Ecovyst, a global provider of advanced materials, specialty catalysts, sulphuric acid and regeneration services based in Malvern, Pennsylvania. Ecovyst's business structure includes two core business units: Advanced Materials and Catalysts (AM&C) and Ecoservices. Ecovyst more than 900 employees throughout its 12 facilities across multiple locations worldwide and its Ecoservices division is a North American provider of sulphuric acid and sulphuric acid regeneration services.
Will energy uses drive future methanol demand?
Methanol demand is rising again after a few years of relative stagnation, but with the Chinese MTO boom largely over, it looks to be energy uses which will drive most future demand.