New import terminals, energy hubs, bunker facilities & upgrades to existing ammonia storage facilities are underway across Europe. This week, we explore new project announcements in Wilhelmshaven, Brunsbüttel, Rotterdam and Immingham. We visit Taiwan for another ammonia import terminal announcement, and look at a new partnership between thyssenkrupp and ADNOC to deploy large-scale cracking - the “last piece of the puzzle” for global ammonia trading.
H2Global has launched its first tender process for the import of “green” ammonia into Europe, with a €360 million, ten year contract on offer beginning in 2024. In Germany, public gas company VNG and Total Eren will work towards ammonia imports into Rostock from 2028. VNG is already developing a significant clean production & import hub at Rostock, after an agreement with Equinor earlier this year.
Air Products and Mabanaft will develop ammonia import & distribution infrastructure at Mabanaft’s existing tank terminal at the Port of Hamburg. From 2026, ammonia imports will be “converted” to hydrogen at Air Products facilities in Hamburg, then distributed to customers in northern Germany. Meanwhile, RWE and Hyphen have signed an offtake agreement, with 300,000 tonnes per year from Hyphen’s under-development mega-project in Namibia to be shipped to Germany. RWE is developing an ammonia import terminal in Brunsbüttel (just up the Elbe River from Hamburg), which will be ready to receive shipments from 2026.
A shipment of thirteen tonnes of CCS-based ammonia has arrived in Hamburg from ADNOC’s al Ruwais ammonia plant near Abu Dhabi. This “demonstration cargo” has been in the works since March this year, when ADNOC signed an agreement with a raft of German organisations, including metals manufacturing giant Aurubis. The ammonia will be trialed as fuel to power copper rod production at Aurubis’ Hamburg smelter.
Deutsche Bahn and Fortescue Future Industries will collaborate to modify existing locomotive diesel engines to run on hydrogen & ammonia fuel. The pair will utilise Ammonigy’s ammonia cracking technology in their design, with a prototype, bench-top engine currently undergoing testing in Germany. This week FFI also signed an agreement to develop a new energy import terminal in Wilhelmshaven.