CEH Report

Table of Contents

Abstract

Sulfuric acid is one of the world's largest-volume industrial chemicals. The production of phosphate fertilizer materials, especially wet-process phosphoric acid, is the major end-use market for sulfuric acid, accounting for nearly 53% of total world consumption in 2008. The balance is consumed in a wide variety of industrial and technical applications. Apparent world sulfuric acid consumption increased by about 25% between 1990 and 2008. Socialist Asia is the major market, accounting for about 28% of world consumption in 2008, followed by the United States, which consumed about 19%. Africa accounted for 10%. The former USSR, Central and South America, and Western Europe are also large users, each accounting for around 6–8% of world consumption. Major declines have occurred in the former USSR, Western Europe, and Central and Eastern Europe since the late 1980s. Major increases occurred in Socialist Asia, Africa, Southeast Asia, Central and South America, Southwest Asia and the Middle East between 1990 and 2008.

The global sulfuric acid market experienced an unprecedented rise and fall in pricing between fall 2007 and spring 2009. Consumption of sulfuric acid for fertilizers fell steeply in the second half of 2008 due to the collapse in the global economy. The second half of 2009 is expected to experience almost flat to slightly positive growth, anticipating the improvement in market conditions in 2010. Trade is expected to fall globally, except for Southeast Asia, which would continue to depend on imports. As of early spring 2009, the market is continuing to deteriorate as the supply shortage situation has been replaced by product oversupply in almost all regions.

Previously negotiated contract prices do not reflect the actual market conditions as consumers look for excess storage capacity since consumption has declined as a result of lack of demand. Contract renegotiations are happening worldwide, even in cases where cargo is in transit to its destination. In places such as China, smelters have reported selling at negative prices, as the oversupply situation is forecast to persist in the near future. Prices have been falling as a result of reduced demand and also the increasing availability of surplus sulfur. However, in Central and South America, there are pockets where acid supply is still tight, because there is relatively less product reaching the region and there are not that many local smelter capacities to satisfy demand.

The following pie chart shows world consumption of sulfuric acid:

Future growth for sulfuric acid is hard to predict and depends a lot on the fertilizer market. Fertilizer demand is seen to be influenced by the ongoing global economic crisis, credit availability, and dietary changes in the general population. It will also be influenced by the rate of increase in biofuels production, especially corn-based fuels. Within this context, global demand for sulfuric acid is projected to rise at an annual rate of about 1.4% in the next five years. Fertilizer demand for sulfuric acid is forecast to grow at about 1.2% during 2008–2013. Several new phosphate fertilizer plants are scheduled to be constructed over the forecast period, mostly in northern Africa, the Middle East and China. Nonfertilizer sulfuric acid demand will mostly come from nickel operations.