Germany’s RWE Supply & Trading, Essen, a multinational utility company, and South Korea’s Lotte Chemical Corp., Seoul, have signed a Joint Study Agreement (JSA) with Mitsubishi Corp., Tokyo, to develop a large-scale integrated clean ammonia production and export project at the Port of Corpus Christi, Texas.
The three announced the signing of the JSA on Feb. 8 to form a strategic alliance to jointly develop large-scale clean ammonia (green and blue ammonia) supply chains in Asia, Europe, and the US.
Under the JSA, the partners agreed to jointly study the development of a large-scale ammonia facility that integrates green and blue ammonia production and leverages common infrastructure for international exports with a focus on Asia and Europe. The partners target first production by 2030 and a phased build-out of production capacity with multiple production units.
In the final build-out stage the project is envisaged to produce up to 10 million mt/y of clean ammonia. The land required for the project is under discussion with the Port of Corpus Christi Authority. The partners are bringing together complementary expertise to develop the project.
Bloomberg reported last fall that Mitsubishi was considering the development of the world’s largest ammonia production plants at Corpus Christi (GM Sept. 30, 2022).
The parties said the JSA complements other preliminary efforts to develop large-scale clean ammonia projects including the South Texas region.
In the meantime, the Port of Corpus Christi is getting ready for blue and green ammonia development. On Feb. 1 it announced that it was awarded $16.4 million through the US Department of Energy’s (DOE) Carbon Storage Assurance Facility Enterprise initiative to evaluate the technical and economic feasibility of permanently storing captured carbon dioxide from industrial operations. It said it was the only recipient of CarbonSAFE funding in Texas and received the largest total award of those announced by DOE.
In addition, in January the Port was notified by DOE that it was being encouraged to submit a full application for its Horizons Clean Hydrogen Hub (HCH2) though DOE’s Regional Clean Hydrogen Hubs Program.
Last August, the Port approved a lease agreement with Buckeye Partners LP that will establish the first solar farm in the 100-year history of the Port. The 81,000+ panel project will be located in San Patricio County on Port of Corpus Christi property near Midway Junction.
All three JSA partners are already heavily involved in blue and green ammonia and/or hydrogen development. In addition to the Corpus Christi plans, Mitsubishi announced in 2021 that it was eyeing the development of a 1 million mt/y blue ammonia plant between Donaldsonville, La., to the west of Houston (GM Sept. 24, 2021), as well as a smaller project in Alberta.
In addition, Mitsubishi has signed to take up to 40% of the blue ammonia from a proposed Nutrien Ltd. ammonia plant in Geismar, La. (GM May 20, 2022). The company has been in the ammonia trading business since the late 1960’s and is currently the indirect shareholder of PT Panca Amara Utama (PAU), which is responsible for a 700,000 mt/y ammonia plant in Indonesia.
RWE announced plans to build an ammonia import terminal in Brunsbüttel, Germany by 2026. It said it is driving forward with more than 30 green hydrogen projects. It recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Namibia’s Hyphen Hydrogen Energy, Windhoek, for supply of up to 300,000 mt/y of green ammonia from 2027 (GM Dec. 9, 2022), and it is looking at bringing green hydrogen/ammonia to Europe from Australia (GM April 23, 2021).
Lotte has signed a deal with Japan’s Itochu, Tokyo, to jointly invest in ammonia production facilities (GM July 29, 2022) and has inked an offtake agreement to take green ammonia from Trammo Inc. (GM Sept. 17, 2021). In late 2022, it partnered with six other companies to build a clean ammonia supply chain in the West Sea region of Korea. Lotte said it plans to invest $3.6 billion by 2030 to produce 1.2 million mt/y of clean hydrogen, and hopes to make annual revenue of $3.6 billion from its hydrogen and ammonia business.