The 2024 merchant carbon dioxide (CO2) business will face the typical sourcing issues encountered every year – primarily, the normal plant turnarounds that start in March and carry into the summer, when ammonia plants are taken down for maintenance after the growing season.
The industry did not experience any severe disruptions this past year, such as was experienced with the Jackson Dome and railroad shipping delays in 2022. However, the merchant CO2 industry is threatened by the federal government’s push toward decarbonization using tax credits, which looks set to impact the critical CO2 supply chain to some extent, including important end-use markets like food processing. In response to this threat, the Compressed Gas Association (CGA) established the CO2 Solutions Coalition last year to begin to address these concerns (see the coverage on p32).
Demand is projected to grow at 2%, but the industry does not have sufficient new sources coming online to support that growth. Maintaining and improving current processing system efficiency, investing in recycling systems, or investing in alternative sustainable sources of CO2 are all options that need to be investigated.
Last year’s report emphasized the need for end-users and suppliers of CO2 to strategically manage CO2 supply and act now to mitigate future disruptions as far as possible. There is evidence this has happened in some quarters, with industrial gas distributors making a better job of diversifying their sourcing to take more control.
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