Honeywell confirmed that the company’s Hopewell, Va., facility, which produces caprolactam and ammonium sulfate fertilizer, returned to production on Monday, Dec. 20, after shutting down the week after Thanksgiving with mechanical problems.
The company would not provide details about the specific issue at the plant, but company sources reported on Dec. 21 that the plant was at full production after the “mechanical failure” was corrected. The Hopewell facility’s nameplate capacity for its Sulf-N ammonium sulfate fertilizer grades is 1.4 million mt/y.
The weeks-long outage caused an already tight domestic ammonium sulfate market to tighten even further, prompting some price increases from other producers. Effective Dec. 20, America Plant Food Corp.’s (APF) granular ammonium sulfate postings at Texas shipping points firmed $20/st to $245/st FOB Freeport, $255/st FOB Galena Park, $270/st FOB Fort Worth, and $285/st FOB Littlefield. The granular ammonium sulfate posting at Mermentau, La., moved to $275/st FOB.
APF’s coarse grade ammonium sulfate postings firmed on Dec. 20 to $235/st FOB Freeport, $245/st FOB Galena Park, $260/st FOB Fort Worth, and $275/st FOB Littlefield, while standard grade moved to $230/st FOB Freeport and $270/st FOB Littlefield. The company’s N-Pac Compacted posting moved on Dec. 20 to $260/st FOB Galena Park.
Higher ammonium sulfate postings from Agrium Inc. and DSM Chemicals were announced on Dec. 16, with Agrium moving up $30/st from previous list prices in the Northern Plains region, and DSM firming $30/st from previous levels in the Southeast region (GM Dec. 20, pp. 12-13).
In the Western U.S., International Raw Materials Ltd. hiked its ammonium sulfate postings on Dec. 17. IRM moved its granular and regular grade ammonium sulfate prices on that date to $305/st FOB and $310/st DEL in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Montana, with fluid grade moving to $285/st FOB and $290/st DEL in those four states.
IRM’s Dec. 17 ammonium sulfate postings in California included $275/st FOB Chico for regular grade, with fluid grade moving to $250/st FOB Sacramento and $255/st FOB Chico.