Tatarstan breaks ground for $1.6bn urea fertiliser plant

KAZAN. The fertiliser plant Mitsubishi Heavy Industries is building in Russia’s republic of Tatarstan will go on stream in 2015, Tatarstan Minister of Construction, Architecture and Housing and Utilities Irek Faizullin said.Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries has been contracted to build a $1.6bn nitrogen fertiliser plant capable of producing ammonia, granular urea and methanol concurrently. The main investors for the project are the government of Tatarstan represented by the local Investment Venture Fund, and Russian bank VEB.The new plant, to be built in Mendeleyevsk, will be one of the world's largest plants capable of concurrently producing ammonia and methanol from natural gas. The plant will have a capacity to produce 717,000 metric tons of ammonia annually, 230,000 tons of methanol, 717,000 tons of urea and 380,000 tons of ammonium nitrate.The project is expected to return investment in six or seven years.The Japanese company Sojitz will handle coordination between related parties and the logistics for construction while Mitsubishi will build the plant. The technology to be used for building the plant has been developed by the Danish company Haldor Topsoe. Tatgazinvest, Gazprom’s operator in Tatarstan, will supply natural gas to feed the plant.