By Alice McFarlane

A new fertilizer plant for Saskatchewan

Jun 24, 2021 | 3:28 PM

MELFORT, Sask. – A new sulphur enhanced urea fertilizer manufacturing facility will be built near Saskatoon, Sask.

The fertilizer uses Shell Thiogro technology, a patented process for the incorporation of micronized elemental sulphur into urea, resulting in a sulphur form that is available to plants across the growing season, according to Ross Guenther, president and co-owner of Northern Nutrients.

“The adoption of the products by producers and the anticipated increasing demand has convinced us to produce our own form of the sulphur-enhanced urea in Canada,” Guenther said.

Northern Nutrients has imported Shell sulphur urea into North America for the past three years.

Matt Owens of Emerge Ag Solutions and co-owner of Northern Nutrients said they first tried the sulphur product three years ago.

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“All our growers who have tried it have increased their acres and moved all of their sulphur requirements over to the Shell micronized sulphur urea product,” Owens said. “They like the product (11-0-0-75) because it is readily available to the plant early and throughout the growing season, it mixes well in any dry blend, and it has a low salt index compared to other forms of sulphur.”

Owens said the customer response helped them make the decision to invest in the company.

“We are very optimistic about what the sulphur product and the new phosphorus product could mean for farmers. The lower salt index is important in our area, and I also like that it is much less dusty than ammonium sulphate,” Owens said.

Curtis Bowditch from Tisdale, Sask. has been using sulphur-enhanced urea for three years.

“The seed safety of the product was a game-changer for our farm and allows us to get both our phosphorus and sulphur in the seed-row for the first time,” Bowditch said. “Logistically it was a huge time saver.”

Northern Nutrients expects to start construction of the plant next month with completion projected for early in 2022.

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alice.mcfarlane@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @farmnewsNOW