The next Haber-Bosch Moment: It’s Time to Reinvent Fertilizer Production
By Magnolia Tovar, Director of Technologies and Impact. Originally part of an OpEd, see official publication in EuroNews here.
The next Haber-Bosch moment: It’s Time to Reinvent Fertilizer Production
About half of the world’s population is alive thanks to synthetic fertilizers. At the heart of modern agriculture lies ammonia, the key ingredient used to produce nitrogen fertilizers such as urea, the most used nitrate fertilizer in modern agriculture to sustain crop yields across the globe.
Developed in the early 20th century by German scientists, Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch, the industrial synthesis of ammonia transformed food systems and supported unprecedented population growth worldwide. It also helped turn Europe into a global leader in science and an economic powerhouse.
Today, however, the same Haber-Bosch process reveals Europe’s vulnerability to geopolitical, economic, and environmental risks associated with its food value chain.
Ammonia production relies heavily on natural gas, primarily as a feedstock to produce hydrogen, which is then reacted with nitrogen in the air. As a result, the modern food system is tightly coupled to fossil fuel markets. When gas prices rise, fertilizer production becomes significantly more expensive, undermining the competitiveness of European industry and increasing costs across the agricultural value chain.
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, this vulnerability has become impossible to ignore. In 2022, European gas prices surged from below €20 per MWh to more than €300 per MWh. Fertilizer production plants across the continent, including industrial leaders like BASF, were severely affected by this gas price shock. At the peak of the crisis, as much as 70% of Europe’s ammonia production capacity was offline.
The conflict in the Middle East has once again highlighted the risks of relying on gas imports and fossil-delivered exports to sustain our food system: roughly one-third of global fertiliser exports pass through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical gateway that proved highly vulnerable to disruption.
Europe’s rapidly eroding manufacturing base now carries strategic consequences. It increases reliance on fertilizer imports from countries like Algeria, China, Egypt, Russia, and the United States, where Europe is facing an uneven playing field. This creates a paradox: while European policymakers seek to reduce reliance on imported fossil fuels, the continent risks becoming more dependent on imported nutrients, produced from fossil fuels, essential for food production.
Europe has been here before. Before the invention of the Haber-Bosch process, European agriculture relied heavily on nitrate imports from Chile, creating supply vulnerabilities that shaped geopolitical strategy. Today, the risk is returning in a new form. It is not driven by the scarcity of imports, but by dependence on fossil fuel. Maintaining Europe’s industrial leadership requires a new wave of innovation.
Beyond the economic and strategic case lies the climate imperative. Global ammonia production emits roughly 450 million tonnes of CO₂ each year – comparable to more than twice the yearly emissions of Spain. Reimagining fertilizer production is therefore not only an industrial opportunity, but essential to meeting climate targets while safeguarding food security.
Europe has begun exploring low-carbon ammonia production using hydrogen generated from renewable electricity or through carbon abatement technologies. However, these pathways remain focused on Haber-Bosch, and hinge on the challenging availability of a clean source of carbon to produce urea.
New technological approaches could change the equation entirely. Emerging processes aim to produce nitrogen-based fertilizers directly from nitrogen in the air, water, and electricity, eliminating reliance on fossil gas and potentially bypassing hydrogen altogether, complementing the existing fertilizer production processes.
Processes such as plasma-based and electrochemical ammonia synthesis do not require hydrogen as feedstock. However, in the latter case, if ammonia is further converted into urea, a clean source of carbon would still be required. Plasma-based can be combined with inexpensive calcium carbonate (e.g., from limestone) to produce nitrogen-based fertilizer.
If brought to scale, aided by low-cost renewable energy, these technologies could enable fertilizer production that is geographically flexible, resilient to geopolitical shocks, and with much lower emissions.
Public investment, targeted market incentives and regulatory support will be needed to accelerate the development and deployment of innovative fertilizer technologies, so Europe regains its industrial base in a highly strategic sector. And once other countries begin to adopt the new production processes, powered by clean electricity, the effect of avoided greenhouse gas emissions would be significant.
Europe’s food and energy security are increasingly exposed to geopolitical shocks and gas price volatility. By investing in innovation in fertilizer production, Europe can strengthen its industrial resilience, reduce structural dependencies, and support a food system aligned with its climate targets.
The Haber-Bosch process helped define the 20th century. Reinventing fertilizer production will help determine Europe’s resilience in the 21st.
Europe has the scientific expertise, market scale, policy mechanisms, clean energy potential, and industrial know-how needed to pioneer the next generation of fertilizer production technologies. Its next Haber-Bosch moment is within reach.