QatarEnergy Starts Building 1.2 MMtpa Blue Ammonia Facility

QatarEnergy has broken ground for a blue ammonia project in Mesaieed Industrial City that it says will be the biggest of its kind in the world with a capacity of 1.2 million tons per annum (MMtpa).

With an investment of about QAR 4.4 billion ($1.2 billion), the project will also have a carbon dioxide injection and storage unit with a capacity of 1.5 MMtpa, according to an online statement by the state-owned gas giant. QatarEnergy expects to start production in the second quarter of 2026.

“QatarEnergy will provide the new plant with more than 35 megawatts of electricity from the solar power plant currently being built in Mesaieed Industrial City, thereby becoming blue ammonia”, QatarEnergy president and chief executive Saad Sherida Al-Kaabi told the groundbreaking ceremony.  Deputy Amir Abdullah bin Hamad Al Thani laid the foundation stone.

“The blue ammonia plant joins a list of QatarEnergy’s large and ambitious expansion projects in Qatar and around the world covering LNG, oil and gas exploration and production, petrochemicals, fertilizers, solar power, and more”, added Al-Kaabi, who is also Qatar’s energy affairs minister.

The facility will be built using local expertise and capabilities in partnership with Qatar Fertilizer Co., Al-Kaabi said.

The Gulf state is growing its urea production to 12.4 MMtpa through another project announced by QatarEnergy September 1, 2024. The urea production project will have three ammonia production lines to supply feedstock to four urea trains in Mesaieed.

For the blue ammonia project, the engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning contract was awarded 2022 to a consortium between Essen, Germany-based thyssenkrupp AG and Athens, Greece-headquartered Consolidated Contractors Co.

The single-train project will use thyssenkrupp’s trademarked ammonia technology, enabling a daily capacity of 3,500 metric tons. “With our well-proven uhde® dual pressure technology, clean ammonia can be produced in large quantities”, then-thyssenkrupp Uhde chief executive Cord Landsmann said in a company statement October 31, 2022.

“CCC’s scope of work consists of the construction of one new Ammonia Plant on the Q7 site in Mesaieed Industrial City south of Doha, offsite and utilities works at the Q5-Q6 site, CO2 transfer line over the existing piperack and an NH3 loading area”, CCC said separately at the time. “The works comprise civil works, EPC for 2 buildings, EPC for 2 tanks, structural steel supply, and installation, equipment erection, piping fabrication and erection, painting and insulation works, and electrical/instrumentation”.

According to QatarEnergy, Mesaieed offers a strategic location for the project due to the city’s “integrated infrastructure, ideal capabilities, and a port that is considered one of the largest petrochemical export facilities in the Middle East”.

The project’s power source, the Mesaieed solar project, is expected to be completed this year.

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