The shutdown of Nutrien Ltd.’s nitrogen operations on the Caribbean nation of Trinidad and Tobago enters its third week with no planned restart, potentially jeopardizing availability of ammonia and methanol.
With North American farmers already grappling with high input costs and geopolitical complications involving other critical fertilizers, any disruption to ammonia supplies is unwelcome Farmers already are financially squeezed by elevated prices for other key fertilizers, including monoammonium phosphate (MAP) and potash. While many farmers apply anhydrous ammonia during the spring planting season, some use the fertilizer after fall harvest.
Anhydrous ammonia price impacts
University of Missouri agricultural economist Ben Brown said the Trinidad shutdown may not pose a significant threat to near-term supplies because the U.S. produces nearly all of the anhydrous ammonia it consumes.
However, “if the shutdown is prolonged, it could continue to shrink the available supply of ammonia to the global market,” Brown says. Additionally, “the prices for domestic producers can be increased if global users are willing to pay more. Ammonia is currently one of the cheapest global forms of nitrogen, so there is upside price potential.”
Ammonia is a critical crop nutrient for U.S. farmers, primarily used as a highly concentrated nitrogen fertilizer in the form of anhydrous ammonia, or NH3. Nutrien is the world’s third-largest nitrogen producer, and Trinidad is the second-largest exporter of ammonia to the U.S. next to Canada, accounting for about 37% of all imports in 2024. Nutrien’s Trinidad operations produce about 85,000 metric tons of ammonia per month, along with 55,000 MT of urea, another critical fertilizer.
StoneX fertilizer analyst Josh Linville said that anywhere from one-third to one-half of the NH3 imported into the U.S. comes from Trinidad. “Unexpected production downtime in Trinidad, as well as ongoing U.S. tariffs on the nation, put that normal supply route in danger,” Linville says.
At the end of October, anhydrous ammonia averaged about $828 per ton at Illinois distributors, up 21% from $685 a year earlier, according to USDA reports.
Unclear how long shutdown will last
It’s unclear how Nutrien’s shutdown or the Trinidad port standoff may last. Trinidad's National Energy Company wants to increase port charges by as much as 200% and apply the increases retroactively to 2020, Reuters reported last month, citing people familiar with the issue. Two of the world's largest methanol producers, Methanex and Proman, are also facing higher port charges and could be cut off from the port if they don't pay, Reuters reported.
Nutrien began a “controlled” shutdown of its Point Lisas nitrogen operations on Oct. 23 in response to port access restrictions imposed by Trinidad and Tobago’s National Energy Corp., Saskatchewan-based Nutrien said. The facility remained closed last week.
Divining when the facility might open and how it will impact supply is difficult.
- In its third-quarter earnings report last week, Nutrien said its nitrogen sales volume guidance “assumes no additional sales volumes from our Trinidad operations for the remainder of 2025.”
- However, the company noted losing that source is “partially offset by the continued strong performance of our North American nitrogen operations.”
- Company officials decline to elaborate on when they expect to resume Trinidad operations. During a call last week with analysts, Nutrien CEO Ken Seitz said the company is “certainly not prognosticating that we’re going to be shut down into 2026. We’re working through that at the moment,” according to a transcript of the call.
- And yet, Nutrien said it still expected to attain its previous 2025 annual nitrogen sales volume guidance range of 10.7 million MT to 11.2 million MT. Nutrien “expects to remain within its 2025 nitrogen sales volume guidance, supported by reliable production from our North American facilities,” the company said in its statement.
“We remain committed to constructive engagement with stakeholders,” Nutrien said in a statement late last month. “However, we have not reached a solution that would allow us to restart operations under viable economic conditions. These challenges include $28 million in unilateral and retroactive port access fees, as well as the absence of a reliable and economically sustainable natural-gas supply.”