LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRIAL AMMONIA CRACKING PLANT

LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRIAL AMMONIA CRACKING PLANT

The study investigated the possibilities for a large central ammonia cracking facility to generate hydrogen from imported ammonia in the Port of Rotterdam, with a capacity of 1 million tons of hydrogen per year (equivalent to ~3000 ton/day or 1.3 million Nm³/h of H₂).

This results in an approximate consumption of 20,000 tons of ammonia (NH₃) per day. In addition to the ammonia cracking process plant, the study also looked at possible setups for the storage and distribution of the ammonia imported into the Harbour Industrial Complex (HIC).

The key aims of the study were to get a first understanding of the technologies available on offer, how far these processes are developed for commercial deployment, the energy and utility consumption of such processes, the number of process trains required to achieve the desired H₂ capacity (related to the maximum feasible per-train capacity), environmental footprint / emissions, general plot space requirements, safety and logistics associated with ammonia storage and handling, capital and operating cost of the required facilities, and the benefits of a central large scale ammonia cracking facility versus several smaller decentralised plants

Ammonia and Hydrogen