Germany’s Largest Ammonia Producer Down to 40% Operating Rate

Germany’s largest ammonia and urea fertilizer producer SKW Piesteritz is currently operating only around 40% of its ammonia production capacity.

Specifically, one of the two ammonia production units is offline entirely even after recent maintenance on it was completed, while the other is operating at a technical minimum amounting to a roughly 20% decrease in its nameplate capacity, a spokesperson for SKW Piesteritz’s Czech parent company AGF Nitrogen confirmed to Expana this week. Both units are nominally able to produce around 1,650 tonnes per day.

It was claimed that at a group-wide level, no other ammonia production units have been taken offline completely, although production is at a technical minimum across the network. Beyond SKW Piesteritz, AGF Nitrogen makes ammonia at Duslo (Slovakia), and LAT Nitrogen (France and Austria); it is also in the process of acquiring a stake in OCI Nitrogen, with production in Geleen, the Netherlands.

In early September, the group warned of the possibility of ammonia production cuts amid pressures from high gas and CO2 emissions prices and low fertilizer demand.

Meanwhile, the spokesperson said that “supply of CO2 to the merchant market is not affected” by the current ammonia production operating rates. AGF Nitrogen captures and supplies CO2 to the merchant market at most of its production sites. Merchant CO2 is used by the food industry to carbonate beverages, modify the atmosphere of packaged foods to promote freshness, and promote growth in greenhouses, among its many applications.