Danish technology provider Topsøe A/S, Copenhagen, and New York City-headquartered First Ammonia LLC on Sept. 14 inked a capacity reservation agreement to kickstart the global market for green ammonia.
The deal provides for First Ammonia’s initial purchase of 500MW of Topsøe’s solid-oxide electrolyzers (SOEC). The deal is expandable to up to 5GW over its lifetime.
“At 5GW, this would be the largest ever electrolyzer reservation of any type,” the companies said. “The production of 5 million mt/y of green ammonia would eliminate 13 million mt of CO2 emissions annually, the equivalent of taking 9 million petrol-fueled cars off the road.”
First Ammonia is developing a global network of modular, commercial-scale plants to produce green ammonia from renewable energy utilizing Topsøe’s SOEC technology. The first 500MW of capacity will be installed in First Ammonia’s green ammonia plants under development in the southwestern US and in Wilhelmshaven, Germany. Operations are planned for 2025, and are expected to be the world’s first commercial-scale, green ammonia production facilities.
According to its website, First Ammonia said the plant in Wilhelmshaven is expected to be fully operational in first-quarter 2025. In addition to rapidly rolling out green ammonia projects in Europe, the US, and Southeast Asia, First Ammonia said it intends to build the first combustion engine to run on 100% ammonia through its affiliate, First Ammonia Motors.
First Ammonia did not specify where the US plants would be. The company’s Head of US Project Development, Lee Raymond, has over 20 years of project management experience, the last 10 of which were spent developing ammonia and methanol plants in the US, most recently with the Pacific Coast Fertilizer project in Longview, Wash., which did not advance (GM Aug. 7, 2020).
First Ammonia is an affiliate of the $5.5 billion investment manager, Christofferson, Robb & Company, which has offices in New York City and London.
Topsøe’s SOEC manufacturing plant is to be built in Herning, Denmark, and has recently received the final investment go-ahead from the company’s board.