The global Green Fertilizers Market was valued at USD 2,145.73 Million in 2022 and is projected to reach USD 3,332.26 Million by 2030, growing at a CAGR of 4.5% from 2023 to 2030.

Green Fertilizers Market Overview:

The fertilizer industry has found the green fertilizer technologies that have the most potential. The challenge is to find a way for low-carbon products to make money. This can be done by lowering costs, fixing technical problems on the supply side, and making a market for high-quality foods with a low carbon footprint. Mineral fertilizers now make it possible for the world to grow 50% of its food. But making it takes a lot of energy. About 5% of all the gas used in the world goes to making ammonia. To reduce the amount of carbon dioxide released by this process, renewable energy must be used to make ammonia, which is a key part of mineral fertilizers. Green ammonia, which is also called "low-carbon fertilizer," could help reduce the amount of carbon used to grow food.

Green fertilizers are mineral fertilizers based on nitrates that have the same chemical and physical makeup as fertilizers made with fossil fuels (natural gas, coal, and oil), but they have a much smaller carbon footprint because they are made with renewable electricity (hydro, wind, solar). That is, green fertilizers are a simple, non-fossil, and low-impact way to reduce the amount of carbon used to make food. Mineral fertilizers are built on a base of ammonia. Hydrogen made from fossil fuels is now used to make ammonia. Renewable electricity will be used to electrolyze water to get the hydrogen needed to make green fertilizers. After the hydrogen is taken out to make green ammonia, all other processes will stay the same. This includes using the best available technology (BAT), which is a catalytic process that reduces greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions during production.

Market Dynamics

Population and economic growth around the world, along with rapid urbanization, will cause a big change. Today, droughts, wildfires, heavy rains, and more pests are all signs of how climate change is affecting agriculture in the United States. Since 1990, greenhouse gas emissions from farming have gone up by 11%, making up 9% of all greenhouse gas emissions in the US. As the U.S. joins the rest of the world in trying to stop climate change, the agricultural sector will have to do two things: reduce greenhouse gas emissions and make farms more resistant to climate change. This will require more sustainable farming methods, also called "climate-smart" farming. In December 2015, 196 governments met in Paris and agreed to work together to stop climate change. Even though the Paris agreement doesn't spell out agriculture's role in reducing global emissions, it does offer opportunities for both reducing emissions and adapting to them. It also says in its preamble that the global community must deal with the effects of climate change on agriculture in order to make the world more resilient and improve food security. The agreement says that "the increase in the average global temperature should be kept well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, and efforts should be made to keep the increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius."

All fertilizers with mineral nitrogen start with ammonia, which connects the nitrogen in the air to the food we eat. About 70% of ammonia is used to make fertilizers, and the rest is used in industries to make things like plastics, explosives, and synthetic fibers. In the future, ammonia could be used as a source of low-carbon energy, but this use is not the main focus of this technology roadmap's analysis. About 2% of all final energy use and 1.3% of all CO2 emissions come from making ammonia. As the world's population grows and gets richer, more ammonia will be made at a time when governments all over the world have said that emissions must go down. In the future, more ammonia will be needed, but less pollution will be put into the air. The demand for ammonia will go up because the world's population is growing and getting richer at the same time that governments around the world have said that emissions from the energy system must go down to Net Zero.

Concerning the rise in the price of natural gas, much of the production was stopped or moved away from normal uses during the February freeze in Texas. The gas was then sent to Texas because the demand was so high. Because of this, US ammonia plants in Oklahoma, Texas, and Louisiana, which make up about 60% of total production, had to shut down. This cut production by 250,000 tonnes. Then Hurricane Ida hit, and work had to stop again. Among these stops in production, COVID-delayed plant turnarounds were stopped again, right when plants were trying to catch up. This caused more production problems, either because maintenance was not done as often as it should have been or because maintenance was done too late. All of these things are making the market for green fertilizer grow.

Green Fertilizers Market Segmentation Analysis

Technology Insights

Alkaline water electrolysis (AWE), which is a well-known, reliable, and traditional method of electrolysis, is expected to grow at the fastest rate during the forecast period. Alkaline water electrolysis is a type of electrolysis that uses two electrodes and a solution of potassium or sodium hydroxide as the electrolyte. Because the catalysts are cheaper and the gas is cleaner, it is being used more and more to make green ammonia. Also, alkaline water electrolysis is more durable because the electrolyte can be changed and the anodic catalyst dissolves less quickly. This is expected to drive segment growth. When the total amount of energy and power used by the ammonia electrolytic cell and the water electrolyzer at different rates of hydrogen production are compared, the water electrolyzer uses up to 65% more energy and power than the ammonia electrolytic cell. So, the ammonia electrolytic cell might be able to use some of the energy from a PEM hydrogen fuel cell to work. Also, the ammonia electrolytic cell uses less energy than a water electrolyzer, which suggests that it could be powered by renewable energy sources and make hydrogen whenever it is needed.

Fertilizer Insights

Ammonium nitrate and calcium ammonium nitrate are two types of nitrate-based fertilizers that work well in the climate of Europe. Plants take in small amounts of ammonium (NH4+) directly, so there will be more demand for ammonium nitrate fertilizer. The positively charged ion doesn't move around as much as nitrate (NO3) and sticks to minerals in the soil. Because of this, the roots of the plant must grow toward the ammonium. Most of the ammonium is turned into nitrate by microbes in the soil. This nitrification process depends on the temperature and can take anywhere from a week to a few weeks. Microbes in the soil lock up some of the ammonium and release it over time, which increases the amount of organic matter in the soil.

Regional Insights:

During the Forecast Period, Europe is anticipated to be the largest market by region.

Europe will dominate the global market in the coming years. Overall, the European fertilizer industry has significantly increased ammonia production's energy efficiency. Due to the physicochemical limitations of existing technology, future investments are likely to only marginally increase efficiency. In general, new plants are highly efficient, but despite their average age, Europe's ammonia plants are the most energy efficient and emit the least CO2 in the world.

Europe is the only region in the world to have drastically reduced N2O emissions from fertilizer production. To surpass current production technology, substantial improvements in energy infrastructure, green energy price competitiveness, scientific breakthroughs, and low-carbon product markets are required.

The United States is anticipated to remain one of the world's fastest-growing markets for the production and consumption of green fertilizer over the forecast period. The country is anticipated to hold a sizeable share of the global green fertilizer market by 2030. The growth of the green fertilizer market in the United States is influenced by the presence of leading green fertilizer manufacturing companies and key technology suppliers, the implementation of stringent regulations, and the increasing popularity of green fertilizers.

Scope Analysis

Recent Development

• In 2022, Norwegian fertilizer giant Yara and leading agricultural cooperative Lantmannen signed a commercial agreement to bring a fossil fuel-free nitrate-based fertilizer to the market next year. Fertilizer is manufactured by Yara and sold by Lantmannen in its home country of Sweden. Fertilizers will be made from ammonia produced using renewable energy such as hydroelectric power, not natural gas.
• In January 2021, ThyssenKrupp AG won an engineering contract with Canadian energy company Hydro-Quebec to install an 88-megawatt (MW) water electrolysis plant. The water electrolysis plant has been identified as having the potential to produce 11,100 metric tons of green hydrogen per year.

The Global Green Fertilizers Market has been segmented into:

By Technology:

• Alkaline water electrolysis
• Proton Exchange Membrane
• Solid Oxide Electrolysis

By Fertilizer:

• Packaging
• Ammonium nitrate (AN)
• Calcium ammonium nitrate (CAN)

By Companies

• Yara International ASA
• Siemens Energy
• Origin Energy Limited
• Iberdrola, S.A.
• HY2GEN AG
• Hive Energy
• Haldor Topsor A/S
• H2U Technologies, Inc.
• Fusion-Fuel
• Fertiglobe
• Eneus Energy Limited
• Enaex Energy
• Dyno Nobel
• CF Industries Holdings, Inc.
• Ballance Agri-Nutrients
• Aker Clean Hydrogen
• Air Products Inc.
• ACME Group