Flexible ammonia production technology is currently scaling up to meet the challenges of fluctuating electricity feedstock. The ability to ramp down plants to 5 - 10% of their nominal load will minimize the requirement for hydrogen storage buffers and reduce the overall cost of renewable ammonia production. The first demonstration-sized flexible ammonia plants are due to begin operations later this year.

New import terminals, energy hubs, bunker facilities & upgrades to existing ammonia storage facilities are underway across Europe. This week, we explore new project announcements in Wilhelmshaven, Brunsbüttel, Rotterdam and Immingham. We visit Taiwan for another ammonia import terminal announcement, and look at a new partnership between thyssenkrupp and ADNOC to deploy large-scale cracking - the “last piece of the puzzle” for global ammonia trading.

Recently, KBR launched its Ammonia 10,000 technology for newbuild ammonia plants, tripling the largest available single train capacity to 10,000 metric tonnes per day. In our latest Technology Insights article, we explore the other pieces of the puzzle required for mega-scale ammonia, as well as some updates from the other end of the spectrum, with three distributed, small-scale ammonia synthesis systems under development in North America.

thyssenkrupp features in two new, million-tonne-per-year ammonia projects. In Louisiana, thyssenkrupp will be the technology provider for Nutrien’s CCS ammonia production plant, while in Qatar they will lead EPCC work on a new, CCS-based production facility due to start operations in 2026.

Reducing the carbon footprint of ammonia is urgent more than ever, and requires new technology innovations to achieve this goal, while keeping these plants competitive and viable. In this session, we will review latest proposed technologies from thyssenkrupp Uhde to achieve ultra-low carbon emissions by implementing a new process flowsheet that replaces the common primary reforming approach and eliminates the need of a fluegas scrubbing system. We will also review the advantages of the new proposed technologies in terms of capex and management of risk associated with new technology implementation.

Brazil’s largest fertiliser producer Unigel has launched the country’s first industrial-scale electrolytic hydrogen & ammonia project. 60 MW of grid-connected, thyssenkrupp nucera electrolysers will feed the production 60,000 tonnes per year of ammonia. An existing ammonia production plant in Camaçari, Bahia province will provide the foundation for the project, which seeks to leverage the high share of renewable electricity in Brazil’s national grid. In other South American news, Uruguay’s officially-released Green Hydrogen Roadmap sets out ambitious decarbonisation goals. Green ammonia has a role both as an export commodity and for domestic use.

LSB Industries will partner with thyssenkrupp and Bloom Energy to develop renewable ammonia production at its existing facility in Pryor, Oklahoma. 30 MW of electrolysers will feed the production of 30,000 tonnes of renewable ammonia per year, with two electrolyser technologies (solid-oxide and alkaline) working side-by-side.

Vietnamese renewable energy project developer The Green Solutions will partner with ECONNECT Energy, thyssenkrupp and Black & Veatch to develop a new renewable hydrogen & ammonia production plant in Tra Vinh province, Vietnam.

A few hundred kilometers to the north, Singapore-based Enterprize Energy is developing a significant offshore wind project with both grid generating and Power-to-X elements. The 3.4 GW Thang Long wind farm will produce grid electricity, renewable hydrogen for local markets and renewable ammonia for export.

Orica and Origin Energy will collaborate on feasibility work and development of the Hunter Valley Hydrogen Hub in Newcastle, Australia. A grid-connected, 55 MW electrolyser will produce green hydrogen from recycled water, with hydrogen to be fed into Orica’s existing ammonia production plant on Kooragang Island. Grid-connected hydrogen production facilities in Newcastle stand to gain access to surplus amounts of renewable electricity in the coming years, with huge commercial investment interest in the under-development Hunter-Central Coast Renewable Energy Zone.

thyssenkrupp will engineer, procure and fabricate a 2 GW+ electrolysis plant at the NEOM project in Saudi Arabia, based on their 20 MW alkaline water electrolysis module. The plant is scheduled to start production in 2026, with hydrogen from the facility will be used to make ammonia for export to global markets. At the Port of Rotterdam, thyssenkrupp will also take the lead on Shell's 200 MW, ‘Holland Hydrogen I’ project, with hydrogen production scheduled to start in 2024.

To address the challenges of the global energy transition and ever increasing project sizes disruptive approaches are required. Being a global market leader in large scale ammonia plants and electrolysis technology thyssenkrupp will expand its production capacity of 1 GW electrolysis cells today to 5 GW by 2025. Within four years the company will therefore be further expanding its technology leadership along the entire green chemicals value chain. This involves not only the series manufacturing of large-scale water electrolyzers, but also further development of technologies for the production of synthetic fuels, green ammonia, green methanol and synthetic natural gas at…

As part of a new partnership with the Queensland state government, Fortescue Future Industries (FFI) announced plans for the world's largest electrolyser, renewable industry and equipment factory in Gladstone. It's been a big week for electrolyser production announcements, with new, GW-scale production facilities planned for Germany and India.

thyssenkrupp's annual production output of 1 GW alkaline water electrolysis cells will expand five-fold, thanks to new funding from Germany's Federal Ministry of Education and Research. There is also federal funding for two additional projects: H2Mare (offshore ammonia production), and TransHyDE (ammonia cracking solutions).

As reported at Ammonia Energy in May, Abu Dhabi Ports and Helios Industry are developing the UAE's first renewable ammonia plant. The 200,000 tonnes per year, green ammonia facility in Abu Dhabi will be powered by a 800 MW solar farm, with Helios investing $1 billion in the plant's construction. The project has a new partner, with thyssenkrupp signing an agreement to perform a technical feasibility study on a plant based on thyssenkrupp's electrolysis technology.

Welcome to the Ammonia Wrap: a summary of all the latest announcements, news items and publications about ammonia energy. This week: latest report from NoGAPS, Viking Energy project takes another step, more collaborations for Yara, thyssenkrupp to invest in cracking R&D, investment in clean hydrogen technology in the USA, world-first visualisation of ammonia combustion in a spark-ignition engine and our numbers of the week.

Welcome to the Ammonia Wrap: a summary of all the latest announcements, news items and publications about ammonia energy. This week: a 30 GW Power-to-X project in Mauritania, green hydrogen and ammonia in Egypt, €8 billion for 62 hydrogen projects in Germany, Cummins' electrolyser gigafactory in Spain, Ammonia engine development in Portugal and Shchekinoazot gets a new decarbonisation partner.

Welcome to the Ammonia Wrap: a summary of all the latest announcements, news items and publications about ammonia energy. This week: the world's largest ammonia manufacturing complex begins decarbonising, a call for green hydrogen projects in Chile, new maritime decarbonisation forecast from MAN ES, decarbonised shipping at the Biden climate summit and Fertilizers Europe welcomes the new Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism.

What are the key considerations that need to be worked through so we can design and implement a certification scheme for low-carbon ammonia that works for a diverse range of stakeholders? On November 17, 2020, the Ammonia Energy Association (AEA) hosted a panel discussion on the topic as part of the recent Ammonia Energy Conference. Not only was it valuable to find out what important players in the ammonia industry want to see in any future certification scheme, but the panel also kicked off a consultation process among AEA members. An audience of around one hundred and fifty producers, end users and researchers all gave their thoughts on what they would like to see in a future scheme, providing a terrific launching point for the AEA Certification Committee to draft, develop and debut a low-carbon ammonia certification scheme.

Adjacent to its steel manufacturing plant in Duisburg, Germany thyssenkrupp has established multi-million dollar testing facility for different kinds of Carbon-2-Chem solutions using the offgases from blast furnaces and coke plants, cleaning and separating those gases into its different components and further processing the components to different chemical products such as ammonia and methanol. Major contributor is also the element hydrogen, which is produced in electrolysis unit based on thyssenkrupp’s Uhde technology. This testing facility focuses mainly on recycling the offgases to maximum extent resulting in most sustainable production processes.

The ammonia industry is transitioning towards sustainability at remarkable speed. In the last week alone, three major project announcements signal the availability of millions of tons of low-carbon ammonia this decade, and enthusiasm for rapid and complete transformation of the industry. Decarbonizing ammonia is no longer viewed as a challenge — now, this is quite clearly an opportunity.

Pandemic or no pandemic, the Australian chapter of the Ammonia Energy Association (AEA Australia) will hold a second edition of its Ammonia = Hydrogen 2.0 Conference this year. The event will be held on a virtual basis on August 27 and 28 from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. (Australian Eastern Standard Time) each day. The conference tagline is “Building an energy export industry using Green Ammonia.” Its themes this year will be “green ammonia production — jobs for the regions;” “ammonia as maritime bunker fuel;” and “ammonia certification schemes.” The opening address, entitled “Ammonia — is it a fuel, or is it an energy carrier?” will be given by Alan Finkel, Chief Scientist of the Australian Government.

Last week, Air Products, ACWA Power, and NEOM announced a $5 billion, 4 gigawatt green ammonia plant in Saudi Arabia, to be operational by 2025. Air Products, the exclusive off-taker, intends to distribute the green ammonia globally and crack it back to “carbon-free hydrogen” at the point of use, supplying hydrogen refueling stations. According to Air Products’ presentation on the project, “our focus is fueling hydrogen fuel cell buses and trucks.” This will be one of the first projects to be built in the industrial hub of NEOM, a futuristic “model for sustainable living.” NEOM is a key element in Vision 2030, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s plan to diversify the Saudi Arabian economy and reduce dependence on oil revenues. In other words, Saudi Arabia is establishing itself as “a global leader in green hydrogen production and green fuels.”

Last week Ammonia Energy published “Europe!”, an article describing the European Commission’s Green Deal and the related appearance of national hydrogen strategies from several European countries. This week we have an article that describes another consequential European initiative that, while related to the Green Deal, is running on a distinct track: the Clean Hydrogen Alliance. Along the way a clear call to action has been sounded for the ammonia energy community.

Last month a group of researchers from the Technion Israel Institute of Technology published a paper, “Decoupled hydrogen and oxygen evolution by a two-step electrochemical–chemical cycle for efficient overall water splitting,” in the journal Nature Energy.  The key word in the title is “efficient.”  In a September 15 Technion press release, the researchers state that their technology “facilitates an unprecedented energetic efficiency of 98.7% in the production of hydrogen from water.”  Applied to the appropriate use case, the technology could lead to a major improvement in green ammonia’s ability to compete with brown ammonia and other low-carbon energy carriers.

Green ammonia concepts from thyssenkrupp are available from 50 to over 5000 tonnes per day. Variability of electrolytic hydrogen feed presents one of the biggest and unique challenge in achieving an optimal and stable functioning of the Haber-Bosch synthesis loop. The solutions to these challenges require a customised approach, dependent on scale and power generation mix of the of the facility. At thyssenkrupp, Australia, we offer local expertise in optimising the concepts for your small and large scale green ammonia applications, underpinned by our know how as a world leading electrolysis and ammonia technology supplier.

After two successful years, the NH3 Event returns on June 6 & 7 in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, for the third edition. Ammonia is still an underestimated route to achieving a sustainable energy economy. At the NH3 Event, members of the energy community, including the public, NGOs, policy-makers, industries, and academics — including well-known experts, developers, and scientists — gather to present the latest research results and commercial achievements, and to discuss new application fields and business prospects for ammonia in energy solutions. And this year with very interesting names!

Last month the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) released Renewable Ammonia Generation, Transport, and Utilization in the Transportation Sector, the organization’s first public treatment of ammonia energy.  The report is positioned as a communique from the cutting edge – a “Technology Insights Brief” from EPRI’s “Innovation Scouts” – and, bracingly, manages to be both brief and comprehensive.  Within its format, it does an excellent job of conveying the positive case for ammonia energy and the R&D that will allow it to reach its potential.

The global ammonia production is nowadays mostly based on fossil energy carriers (natural gas, coal, naphtha, etc.). It consumes approximately 1.4% fossil energy carriers and releases more than 1.4% of global CO2 emissions. In order to continue the global transition from the fossil fuel and nuclear energy age to the renewable energy age, ammonia could play a key role. Beside the continued utilization for fertilizer industry, ammonia could become an energy and/or hydrogen carrier as well. thyssenkrupp Industrial Solutions (tkIS) developed a concept to establish Green Ammonia Plants as an alternative to conventional world-scale ammonia plants. As industry leader in…

In June, ThyssenKrupp announced the launch of its technology for "advanced water electrolysis," which produces carbon-free hydrogen from renewable electricity and water. This "technology enables economical industrial-scale hydrogen plants for energy storage and the production of green chemicals." Two weeks later, in early July, ThyssenKrupp announced that it was moving forward with a demonstration plant in Port Lincoln, South Australia, which had been proposed earlier this year. This will be "one of the first ever commercial plants to produce CO2-free 'green' ammonia from intermittent renewable resources." The German conglomerate is one of the four major ammonia technology licensors, so its actions in the sustainable ammonia space are globally significant.

The second annual Power to Ammonia conference, which took place earlier this month in Rotterdam, was a tremendous success. It was again hosted by Proton Ventures, the Dutch engineering firm and mini-ammonia-plant pioneer, and had roughly twice as many attendees as last year with the same extremely high quality of presentations (it is always an honor for me to speak alongside the technical wizards and economic innovators who represent the world of ammonia energy). However, for me, the most exciting part of this year's event was the fact that, for the first time at an ammonia energy conference, all four of the major ammonia technology licensors were represented. With Casale, Haldor Topsoe, ThyssenKrupp, and KBR all developing designs for integration of their ammonia synthesis technologies with renewable powered electrolyzers, green ammonia is now clearly established as a commercial prospect.

This week, the government of South Australia announced a "globally-­significant demonstrator project," to be built by the hydrogen infrastructure company Hydrogen Utility (H2U). The renewable hydrogen power plant will cost AUD$117.5 million ($95 million USD), and will be built by ThyssenKrupp Industrial Solutions with construction beginning in 2019. The plant will comprise a 15 MW electrolyzer system, to produce the hydrogen, and two technologies for converting the hydrogen back into electricity: a 10MW gas turbine and 5MW fuel cell. The plant will also include a small but significant ammonia plant, making it "among the first ever commercial facilities to produce distributed ammonia from intermittent renewable resources."

The second annual European Conference on Sustainable Ammonia Solutions has announced its full program, spread over two days, May 17 and 18, 2018, at Rotterdam Zoo in the Netherlands. The international cadre of speakers, representing a dozen countries from across Europe as well as the US, Canada, Israel, and Japan, will describe global developments in ammonia energy from the perspectives of industry, academia, and government agencies.