By Li Chong, China Sulphuric Acid Industry Association

Progresses that China’s sulphuric acid industry made during 2016-2020

1) Adjustment in raw material structure

China’s sulphuric acid capacity was up 0.6% from 2015 to 124 million t/a at the end of 2019, when domestic output rose 0.7% from 2015 to 97.36 million tons, accounting for 37.6% of the world’s total and ranking first in the world. But growth of both capacity and output slowed down.

Structure of raw materials changed from 2016 to 2020. More specifically, output of sulphuric acid from smelting process took up 38.4% of the nation’s total in 2019, up 7.2 percentage points from 2015; output of sulphuric acid made from sulphur occupied 42.8%, and that of pyrite-based sulphuric acid 17.3%, both declining significantly; output proportion of sulphuric acid produced via other technologies was 1.5%, basically unchanged.

2) Elimination of outdated capacity

New sulphuric acid projects constructed during 2016-2020 boasted a combined capacity of 25.7 million t/a (21% of the nation’s total capacity), with new capacity of sulphuric acid from smelting process reaching 16.6 million t/a. Meanwhile, some facilities, outdated or highly-polluting, were abandoned, reducing capacity by around 25 million t/a. Hence, more diversified structure of raw materials and more advanced sulphuric acid units.

3) Skyrocketing export volume

Increasing capacity of sulphuric acid not only met domestic demand, but also led to soaring export volume, which surged 971.4% from 2015 to 2.18 million tons in 2019, when China imported only 531 000 tons, plummeting 54.7% from 2015.

4) Diversified consumption structure

China’s apparent consumption of sulphuric acid was down 2% from 2015 to 95.72 million tons in 2019. In detail, fertilizers enterprises consumed 54.64 million tons, down 6.3% from 2015 due to factors like policies on zero increase in usage of fertilizers and sluggish growth of fertilizers export. On the contrary, sulphuric acid consumption in industries (e.g. titanium dioxide, hydrofluoric acid, caprolactam, etc.) was up 4.3% to 41.08 million tons in 2019.

5) Slight decrease in external dependence of sulfur resources

Domestic apparent consumption of sulfur resources was up 8% from 2015 to 38.12 million tons in 2019, when the external dependence was down 1.7 percentage points from 2015 to 51.1%. China’s sulphur output reached 7.66 million tons in the same year, up 33.4% from 2015.

Problems

Idle sulphuric acid units boasted a capacity of 27.5 million t/a, and idle phosphate fertilizers units 6.7 million t/a, both in 2019. Severe overcapacity and market downturn made most firms hard to make profits and hard to invest more in technical R&D, environmental protection, production security, etc. Further, dependence on imported sulfur resources remained high, staying at above 50% during 2016-2020. In 2019, external dependence of sulphur was 60.5%, and that of sulfur resources from non-ferrous metal ore reached around 70%.

Burgeoning smelting industry greatly spurred by-product sulphuric acid capacity, especially in remote and coastal areas. However, most smelting projects are far from regions where sulphuric acid consumers concentrate. To make matters worse, logistics efficiency is low. Every year, 90% of domestic commodity sulphuric acid – around 45 million tons, expected to increase continually – are transported by tank trucks and less than 10% by trains or ships. If each truck transports 40 tons, a large number of tank trucks will be needed annually, increasing transportation costs and bringing safety hazards.

Development trends over next five years

    High-value-added electron-grade, reagent-grade and fuming sulphuric acid will become mainstream products. Enterprises will upgrade technologies to recycle waste heat from sulphuric acid production to support the nation’s “carbon neutrality” target, realize cleaner production, improve production safety, etc. Other trends that will benefit sulphuric acid firms mainly include developing rail transport, expanding tank capacity, disposing sulfur-containing wastes appropriately, etc.