Design and Operation of Large Capacity Ammonia Plants by Peter Vang Christensen Haldor Topsøe A/S, Lyngby, Denmark

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Introduction
The current trend in ammonia industry is towards large single-line plant capacities as a result
of the continuous effort in optimizing and improving ammonia synthesis technology. Today’s
technology has been developed to an extent where much larger plant sizes can be built than in
the earlier days due to improved designs of e.g. primary reformers. The tendency goes
towards installing larger and larger plant capacities, and the capacity limit keeps going
upward.
This paper will describe some of the recent developments enabling the design of very large
plants, e.g. reformer design and burner designs combined with improved ammonia synthesis,
etc. The paper will focus on the special design features and the actual performance obtained
for the following two ammonia plants started up recently.
Profertil, Argentina
With a capacity of 2,050 MTPD of ammonia in one single line, this is the world’s largest
grassroots plant. The plant is part of an ammonia/urea complex producing 3,250 MTPD of
urea in one single line.
P.T. Kaltim Pasifik Amoniak, Indonesia
This ammonia plant has a capacity of 2,000 MTPD in one single line. The ammonia plant is a
stand-alone plant.