One Step at a Time - New Vopak Moda Houston Terminal Anticipates Growing Role for Ammonia

It makes perfect sense, really. If you’re planning to build a large, low-carbon ammonia production facility that’s targeting the export market, why not site it alongside the Gulf Coast’s leading deepwater ammonia terminal? That helps to explain why INPEX Corp., LSB Industries, Air Liquide and Vopak Moda Houston — the last a joint venture of Royal Vopak and Moda Midstream that recently developed the ammonia terminal — are collaborating on the development of a planned 1.1 million ton per annum (1.1 MMtpa) clean ammonia production plant along the Houston Ship Channel. In today’s RBN blog, we discuss the proposed production facility, the markets its clean ammonia would serve, and the benefits of building the project at an existing terminal. 

For many, coal has become a hydrocarbon non grata in recent years, mostly due to the considerable amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) generated when it is burned to produce electric power or heat. But what if, instead of combusting coal on its own, coal plants were co-fired by a combination of environmentally friendly versions of ammonia and the volumes of CO2 generated were way less? And what if, through the 2030s and ’40s, the ratio of fuels used in these coal-and-ammonia-fired power plants shifted away from coal and toward ammonia, and by mid-century the plants were fueled only by “green” or “blue” ammonia, which generates little or no CO2? It may sound too good to be true — heck, it may well turn out to be! But there is a lot of interest in the idea, especially in Japan, where coal still retains a big share of the power generation mix. In today’s RBN blog, we continue to look at the prospects for environmentally friendly hydrogen (H2) — and ammonia, an H2 carrier — in the power generation sector.

The international shipping industry’s push to significantly reduce its carbon footprint over the next three decades is raising an obvious question: Is there a zero- or low-carbon bunker fuel that meets all of the industry’s basic criteria — things like availability, safety, and relative economy, not to mention sufficient on-board energy to transport massive, city-block-sized vessels thousands of miles at a clip. There is no clear answer yet, but there is a lot of talk about ammonia, or more specifically ammonia produced in a way that either generates no carbon dioxide (CO2) or that captures and sequesters much of the CO2 that is generated during production. But several major challenges must be met before “green” and “blue” ammonia can lay claim to even a small slice of the bunkers market, as we discuss in today’s RBN blog.