Sioux City, Iowa—The Woodbury County board has given the go-ahead to the expansion of a small operation that expects to be a major player in the fertilizer business. Prairie Farm Systems Owner Mark Pottorff, who started in the business 25 years ago “for something to do,” now has the approval of the board to take over a parcel of land in unincorporated Luton that once housed a school, which was torn down earlier this year. Board members indicated they support rezoning and cleaning up the plot for a business use. “I have outgrown where I am now. In Woodbury County it is hard to find suitable property. The additional space will let me increase where I sell fertilizer, which is now limited to within about 40 miles of Luton,” Pottorff explained. “What I am going to build is a storage facility and then I want to build a dry fertilizer plant.” He told Green Markets that he’s started to dabble in pelletized lime, ammonium sulfate, urea, and possibly a dry phosphate blend. “I am at the point in my business life where I either have to expand my business or just do the status quo. I have gone from absolutely nothing and, like my accountant said, I’m no longer just a business – I’m a company.” Pottorff wouldn’t say how much Prairie Farm Systems is worth, but did offer that he expects to increase the business up to 50 percent in the next four to five years.
Kilgore, Texas—Martin Midstream Partners LP reported that its Sulfur Services unit, which includes sulfur and fertilizer, continued the momentum they had in the fourth quarter 2011 into the first quarter ending March 31, 2012. Martin said they had stronger-than-expected results with strong margin levels. Martin said the fertilizer production units are running at very high levels of utilization that coincides with strong customer demand for its products. Operating income for the Sulfur Services unit was up 56 percent, to $12.5 million on revenues of $74.5 million from the year-ago $8 million on revenues of $59.7 million. Fertilizer sales volumes were up at 93,900 lt from the year-ago 77,600 lt, while sulfur volumes were down at 308,200 lt from the year-ago 375,300 lt. While Sulfur Services exceeded expectations, the other three Martin units – Terminalling, Natural Gas Service, and Marine Transportation – were slightly below expectations. Still, company-wide, Martin reported increased net income at $10.5 million ($.40 per basic and diluted unit) on revenues of $338.3 million, compared to the year-ago $7.3 million ($.31 per unit) on revenues of $283 million.
Cranbury, N.J.—Specialty phosphate maker Innophos Holdings Inc. reported first-quarter net income of $27.6 million ($1.22 per diluted share) on net sales of $228.2 million, compared to the year-ago $26 million ($1.15 per share) on sales of $197.6 million. Operating income was off slightly, to $38.1 million from $40.8 million. During the quarter, the company reached a settled with former parent Rhodia, including a claim of liability for excess water duty charges in Mexico. As a result, first-quarter net income included a $7.2 million after-tax benefit or $.32 per share. The year-ago quarter also included adjustments to water charges. Excluding these adjustments, first-quarter 2012 net income was $20 million compared to $24 million for the year-ago quarter, with the decline attributable exclusively to results from the GTSP and Other segment (primarily fertilizer co-product). The company noted that sales from this unit increased 64 percent on significantly higher volumes, but market prices were lower and operating income dropped to $4.6 million from $7 million. Innophos said its specialty phosphate products saw sales revenues up 10 percent and prices up 11 percent, though operating income was down slightly to $33.5 million from $33.8 million. Innophos expects market demand in this sector to remain stable to moderately improving, with market volume growth of 4-6 percent for 2012 driven by product innovation and geographic growth.
Cairo—Orascom Construction Industries (OCI) said April 30 that it has received approval from the Egyptian Financial Supervisory Authority to call for an Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) to approve the demerger of the company’s construction business from its fertilizer business. The EGM, in which shareholders will vote on the demerger, will be held May 17. If approved, OCI will split into two separate companies – OCI Fertilizers S.A.E. and Orascom Engineering & Construction S.A.E. Nassef Sawiris will serve as chairman and CEO of OCI Fertilizers, and Salman Butt and Renso Zwiers will serve as CFO and COO, respectively. Sawiris will serve as chairman of Orascom Engineering and Construction, and Osama Bishai and Sherif Tantawy will serve as CEO and CFO, respectively. OCI explained that since 2010, the fertilizer business has grown and has overtaken the construction business in terms of overall EBITDA and net income contribution. For the full year ending Dec. 31, 2011, 69.5 percent of consolidated EBITDA and 71.9 percent of consolidated net income was contributed by the fertilizer business, while 30.5 percent of EBITDA and 28.1 percent of net income was from the construction business. OCI noted that fertilizer and construction offer distinct value propositions to investors. On a pro forma basis, OCI Fertilizers had 2011 net income of $486.1 million on revenues of $2.38 billion, with EBITDA of $976.9 million. Orascom Engineering & Construction had net income of $205.9 million on revenues of $3.22 billion with EBITDA of $443.5 million.
Fort Fairfield, Maine—Cavendish Agri Services’ new $5.7 million fertilizer plant and mixing system, which recently held its grand opening, benefits both from its key location in the heart of potato country as well as having a new high-speed blender. The facility, which will serve growers in Maine and New Brunswick, is one of the largest of this type in New England and the first to be built in Maine in decades. The company said the new blending system will dramatically reduce the time required to fill a typical 16-ton farm truck from 35 to four minutes. Cavendish Agri Services President Robert Irving said the new facility enhances the company’s ability to service the increasingly complex nutrient needs of growers with a highly efficient, 300-ton per hour plant. He said customers can count on Cavendish Agri Services more than ever to meet their need for speedy, reliable, and precise fertilizer blends, even in periods of high demand. The company has approximately 14 locations in Maine and Atlantic Canada.
Hornick, Iowa—A fire that broke out in the fertilizer storage building at Western Iowa Co-op Tuesday, May 1, caused some residents in this small town to evacuate their homes because of smoke concerns. But officials say the fire was contained within an hour, residents were able to return to their homes and no one was injured. Fire authorities were concerned about elderly residents and others having breathing problems from the thick smoke and burning fertilizer and chemicals. The Woodbury County Sheriff’s Office was also worried about air quality and residents’ safety, and urged over 250 residents to evacuate the area. Co-op General Manager John Bender told Green Markets that the fire started in a fertilizer loader inside a 5,000-ton dry storage facility, and a neighbor reported the blaze to the authorities. “Fortunately it isn’t a manned facility, and there were no chemicals in the building. The real concern was 20 mph winds coming in from the south, blowing smoke all over town,” added Bender. “It will be a tough loss. However we will be able to get through. We were just lucky the building was mostly empty and no one was hurt.” He described the building, which normally stores phosphate-based fertilizer, as about 90 percent empty due to the start of the growing season. Concerned about people having breathing problems from the thick smoke and burning chemicals, authorities went door-to-door in order to evacuate some of the residents. Chief Deputy Greg Logan said the evacuation was voluntary. Hornick is located 30 miles southeast of Sioux City.
Morton, Ill.—Investigators found the fish kill in the immediate vicinity almost total after a self-contained sprayer unit making the spring rounds with over 1,100 gallons of a nitrogen-herbicide mixture got hung up on a bridge and tipped over into a stream near here late last month. Illinois Environmental Protection Agency emergency responders spent long hours monitoring the situation and collecting samples to determine how far the chemical moved down stream and the effectiveness of remedial measures being taken. Residents were cautioned about using the water between the spill site and the Mackinaw River (approximately eight miles) as drinking water for animals, recreation, or any other purpose, and to avoid the area until the water is determined to be safe through testing. The advisory stated that while concentrations of the chemicals appear “milky” in the water, there are still dangers even after the water appears to be clear. Morton Fire Chief Joe Kelley calculated that 900 gallons of the mixture of 28 percent nitrogen and 13.3 percent of an herbicide containing Atrazine was emptied into the stream through an opening in the tank. “We worked with a hazmat team to dam up the creek both upstream and downstream and keep as much of the material contained as we could using a backhoe and dirt from the banks of the stream,” Kelley reported. The Illinois EPA has asked the state attorney general’s office to proceed with an enforcement action against Haycock Soil Service Inc., for the discharge of ag chemicals into Prairie Creek, causing a fish kill. Haycock operates an ag chemical facility in Delavan. The state EPA has requested that Haycock be directed to take steps to remove all agricultural chemical contaminants and undertake any measures necessary to prevent them from reaching the Mackinaw River.
Hopewell, Va.—Two contractors with exposure symptoms were taken to the hospital for evaluation and approximately 50 employees briefly evacuated when a small amount of ammonia was released Thursday, April 26, at the Linde carbon dioxide facility here. At the same time, a shelter-in-place order was in effect for approximately 4,000 students for 30-45 minutes in the city’s high, middle, and three elementary schools. Hopewell Battalion Chief Donny Hunter described the ammonia release as amounting to a gallon or 15 pounds that became trapped when the contractors purged the lines. “The biggest thing we did was evacuate the building and monitor the area with ammonia detectors to make sure it didn’t go off-plant, and then we treated two people and transported them to the hospital,” Hunter explained. “We just moved the people from the one building outside to an open field across the street for about two hours. Everything was back to normal about noon.” Others in the industrial section, including several chemical plants, were not affected.
Yosemite National Park, Calif.—It took more than 24 hours of a professional environmental cleanup team working carefully not to cause any ignition to deal with the spilled contents of hundreds of bags of dusting sulfur from a flatbed truck near the south entrance to Yosemite. When they were finished, the team from PARC Environmental of Fresno had worked from late Sunday evening until Monday night, April 23, filling 20 cubic-yard roll-off bins and loading them on a special truck for disposal at a hazardous waste facility. There were a couple of fires that occurred before the PARC personnel arrived on the scene. The spill was caused when the driver crashed into a guardrail and ended up spreading the sulfur for a mile along Highway 41, which links up with the southern entrance of Yosemite National Park. The accident meant that nobody could exit or enter the park through that route, to the disappointment of a crowd of visitors showing up to take advantage of free entrance during National Park Week. Investigators questioned the driver to see why he was carrying a commercial load of sulfur into a national park where commercial trucks are banned. He was held by the National Park Service police for suspicion of driving under the influence.
Tulsa—Magellan Midstream Partners LP reported a 17 percent drop in volumes for its anhydrous ammonia pipeline for the first quarter ending March 31, 2012, to 189,000 st from the year-ago 221,000 st. However, pipeline operating margins nudged up to $3.9 million on revenues of $6.35 million, compared to the year-ago $3.7 million on revenues of $7 million. While volumes and revenues decreased, so did expenses due to reduced environmental accruals to $2.45 million from the year-ago $3.3 million. Company-wide, net income was up, at $93.5 million ($.83 per basic and diluted share) on revenues of $493.5 million, from the year-ago $90.1 million ($.80 per share) on revenues of $442.9 million.
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