LSB Industries to produce CCS ammonia in Arkansas
By on May 05, 2022
El Dorado
LSB’s existing El Dorado ammonia production plant will be retrofitted to capture and sequester CO2 emissions in a nearby underground saline aquifer as part of a new partnership with Lapis Energy. Works will begin immediately, with completion expected by 2025. Subject to the approval of a Class VI permit from the US EPA, operations will also begin in 2025. The sequestered CO2 is expected to qualify for the 45Q federal tax credit.
The carbon emissions captured each year will reduce LSB’s Scope 1 emissions by 25%, and result in the production of over 375,000 tonnes CCS ammonia per year – about 75% of El Dorado’s total ammonia production capacity. El Dorado is well located to deliver this product to customers throughout the US and for international export: it has access to NuStar’s ammonia pipeline that originates on the US Gulf Coast, and easy access to rail transport (more info on El Dorado can be found in LSB’s 2021 annual report).
This project is very compelling for us from both environmental and commercial perspectives. Carbon sequestration is a proven means of reducing greenhouse gas emissions from ammonia production and our El Dorado facility is uniquely located above deep geological formations with the capacity to sequester decades of CO2 production from the plant.
Our customers, particularly our industrial customers, need solutions to help them decarbonize their supply chains and low carbon feedstocks represent an attractive opportunity to accomplish this goal in the near-term, while technologies for more sustainable no carbon or ‘Green Ammonia’ production continue to become economical.
LSB Industries President & CEO Mark Behrman in his organisation’s official press release, 28 Apr 2022
Third CCS ammonia plant in the United States
El Dorado becomes the third publicly announced CCS ammonia project in the US. Last November, the board of CF Industries approved plans to retrofit the Donaldsonville and Yazoo City plants to sequester up to 2.5 million tonnes of carbon emissions per year. In October 2021, Air Products announced a new build CCS hydrogen & ammonia plant in Louisiana.
Beyond these two public announcements, there are a raft of possibilities waiting in the wings. In March this year Maire Tecnimont announced they had been contracted to develop a world-scale blue ammonia plant in the US, with details to follow. In Wyoming, North Shore Energy and Starwood Energy Group have received over $4 million in funding from the Wyoming Energy Authority to develop “Project Phoenix”. In Iowa, the under-development Heartland Greenway CCS system could potentially decarbonise ammonia production at OCI’s Iowa Fertilizer Company plant. And, CF Industries and Mitsui & Co. are currently in a joint exploratory partnership to investigate blue ammonia production in the US.