A simple fertilizer or a dangerous explosive? UN 2067: AMMONIUM NITRATE BASED FERTILIZER

Class / 5.1 - Packing Group???? III

Properties and Observations:

• Crystals, granules or prills.
• Wholly or partly soluble in water.
• Supporters of combustion.
• A major fire aboard a ship carrying these substances may involve a risk of explosion in the event of contamination (e.g. by fuel oil) or strong confinement.
• An adjacent detonation may also involve a risk of explosion.
• If heated strongly, it decomposes, giving off toxic gases and gases which support combustion.
• Transport of AMMONIUM NITRATE liable to self-heating sufficient to initiate decomposition is prohibited.

?The key component in fertilizer:?

Nitrogen is essential for plants, as without it, they cannot produce essential compounds such as chlorophyll. One of the most effective synthetic fertilizers in use today is ammonium nitrate.

Ammonium nitrate (NH4NO3) is an ionic compound containing NH4+(the ammonium ion) and NO3(the nitrate ion).

The efficacy of this compound as a fertilizer is owing to its high nitrogen content (35%), which means that it has more value as a source of nitrogen than alternative fertilizers such as calcium nitrate, Ca(NO3)2 (17% nitrogen).

Commercial production began in 1910 and was first made possible by the development of the Haber process.

Applying high pressure and temperature, alongside a specific catalyst, enabled the fixing of nitrogen from the air to form ammonia (NH3) by reaction with hydrogen.

Oxidation of ammonia produces a range of nitrogen oxides, one of which, NO2, is dissolved in water to form nitric acid (HNO3).

Ammonium nitrate is easy to make: an acid-base reaction between ammonia and nitric acid produces water-soluble ammonium nitrate, which is dried and formed into pellets ready for transport.

However, storing this compound is critical as changes in pressure or temperature can cause decomposition. Ammonium nitrate has two temperature-dependent decomposition pathways:

At lower temperatures, nitrous oxide (N2O, also known as laughing gas) is released;

At higher temperatures, the ammonium nitrate acts as an oxidizer, releasing oxygen that readily reacts with any combustible material.

?As this reaction is exothermic, the heat produced drives the ammonium nitrate to decompose faster, releasing more oxygen and resulting in an uncontrolled runaway reaction.

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Ammonium nitrate, NH4NO3, can be explosive by itself under certain conditions.

It is hard to initiate under normal conditions, but response personnel should still exercise great caution when dealing with ammonium nitrate incidents.

Subjected to confinement or high heat, ammonium nitrate may explode but does not readily detonate. Fertilizer-grade ammonium nitrate, a strong oxidizer above 33.5%, may also explode if it becomes contaminated with organic materials.

?When ammonium nitrate explodes, it produces a type of explosion called a deflagration. Deflagration is a rapid auto combustion that occurs at a subsonic speed of less than 1,250 feet per second. The solid material changes to a gas relatively slowly. A material that deflagrates is considered a low-yield explosive.

In 1911, the chemical company BASF (Bayerishe Anilin und Soda Fabrik) began manufacturing ammonium sulphate ((NH4)2SO4) as a fertilizer at its site in Ludwigshaven, on the river Rhine.

?During the war, sulphur supplies became short, so they made a combined product of ammonium sulphate and nitrate.

Unfortunately, this mixed product tended to absorb water and compress into a very solid cake, particularly when stored in large quantities.

This material could not be easily discharged from the storage silo, so after small-scale safety testing, loosening of the product 'cake' was achieved using dynamite.

?On 21st September 1921, one such small dynamite charge triggered the explosion of a 50,000-tonne silo 111, Oppau – [Rhénanie]Germany, followed moments later by a second nearby.

The blast spanned an area of over 10,000 square meters, forming a crater 19 meters deep and resulting in over 500 casualties.

The United States isn't immune to such slip-ups; another violent explosion occurred in 1947 in the port of Texas City, USA, where two ships containing over 3,000 tons of ammonium nitrate were docked in the harbour.

The ammonium nitrate stored on these vessels was formulated, meaning the active ingredient was combined with other substances, in this case highly combustible petroleum jelly and petroleum wax.

?A smouldering fire was noticed at 8 am in one ship's hold, and fire crews were immediately called. Despite this intervention, the ammonium nitrate detonated with catastrophic consequences soon after, and the official fatalities came to 567, including 28 out of the 29 members of the city fire brigade.

More recently, we've learned the hard way that it doesn't take thousands of tons of chemicals to cause a disaster. In 2013, a Texas fertilizer plant caught fire and exploded, killing 15 people and demolishing hundreds of nearby homes; it was later found to have been storing around 50 tons of ammonium nitrate.

Two thousand seven hundred fifty tons of ammonium nitrate exploded in Beirut, killing around 180 people, bringing down the Lebanese government, and sending officials around the world scrambling to figure out whether similar catastrophes were waiting to happen in their own ports and industrial facilities.

The short answer, of course, was "Yes." Around the world, countless industrial facilities and storage depots store dangerous chemicals in risky ways, including vast quantities of the same agricultural fertilizer that detonated in Beirut. In Dakar, officials found 3,000 tons of ammonium nitrate sitting around in warehouses. In Chennai, port officials admitted they were unsafely storing 800 tons of the chemical. Romanian officials uncovered almost 9,000 tons, including 5,000 tons, at a single warehouse.

Since Ammonium Nitrate is our topic of discussion, for honesty, I have to mention that:

Russia is one of the world's largest exporters of ammonium nitrate. Up north, the port of Kandalaksha on the coast to the White Sea is used for shipping to world markets. The Kola Peninsula is a primary source of fertilizer ore mined in the Khibiny mountains, but production also occurs in other locations in Russia.

The history of Russia's fertilizer industry. It began in the 19th century with the ideas of German scientist Justus von Liebig and was put into practice at the first agricultural school in Cherepovets.?

The industry saw significant growth after the Russian Revolution of 1917 and World War II, with the construction of major plants like the Cherepovets nitrogen-tuck plant in 1969 and the Cherepovets Ammophos Plant in 1974.

Russia produced almost 60M tons of fertilizers last year after becoming the world's most extensive product exporter in 2022, with $18.7B worldwide.

Top destinations of Russian fertilizers include Brazil ($5.31 billion), India ($2.73 billion), the US ($1.95 billion), China ($910 million), and Indonesia ($699 million).

From 2021 to 2022, exports to India increased by over sixfold. In the first seven months of this year, Russia further boosted its output by 13%, according to the Russian news agency TASS.

Fertilizer production is a vital industry that serves as 'an example of what chemistry benefits for all mankind,'

Fertilizer is a crucial agricultural input to feeding the world's population, and Russia is one of the world's largest producers of its mineral variety.??

Russian fertilizers are produced from an ore known as apatite-nepheline, extracted from the Khibiny Mountains, a range located on the Kola Peninsula near Russia's border with Finland. This volcanic rock is rich in phosphorus and free of harmful impurities, ensuring high-quality and environmentally safe fertilizers.

"At a specially designed factory, the ore is separated into apatite and nepheline concentrates,". "The apatite concentrate, in powdered form, is then sent to further processing. It interacts with other ingredients to produce the necessary phosphorus fertilizers."

For example, Phosagro has three production sites across Russia: Cherepovets, Volkhov, and Balakovo; each site has its unique features.

"Cherepovets produces 52 brands of fertilizers, including liquid fertilizers that can be applied to the soil without diluting with water. Among the enterprise's products in Volkhov are phosphorus-containing fertilizers and fertilizers based on potassium and sodium. In addition to fertilizers, animal feed additives are produced in Balakovo,".

The Cherepovets Complex PhosAgro, a successor of that plant, is one of the world's foremost producers of this type of fertilizer.

"Cherepovets was chosen for the plant's construction for its vital transport infrastructure, skilled labour, and access to coke and chemical production from the local metallurgical industry.

"And coke oven gas is an important part of ammonia production. The first products created were ammonia and ammonium nitrate. " As fertilizer production prospered, the facility expanded to include phosphorus fertilizers.