Air Products and Chemicals to build new hydrogen plant in Luling

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Air Products and Chemicals has announced that it will build a new hydrogen plant next to the Monsanto plant in Luling.

The new plant will create a symbiotic relationship with the Monsanto plant, which produces the herbicide Roundup.

Air Products will buy hydrogen produced by Monsanto's production process and Monsanto will buy steam produced by Air Products' manfucaturing process, said Jeff Swann, a business unit leader at Monsanto. The hydrogen is currently vented into the atmoshphere.

"It's a win-win for everybody," Swann said.

The Air Products plant will include a steam methane reformer capable of producing 100 million standard cubic feet of hydrogen per day. It expected to be onstream in January 2012, according to a company news release.

The company also is nearing completion of a similar plant near the Marathon Oil Refinery in Garyville. Hydrogen is used in the production of cleaner-burning fuels.

Mike Frank, Monsanto's manufacturing director in the company's crop protection division, said in the statement that the project will strengthen Monsanto operations, as well as the community.

"It will help us serve our farmer customers in a more environmentally sensitive manner," Frank said in a statement.

Monsanto sells crop seeds that are resistent to Roundup, a weed-killer. That allows farmers to use Roundup to kill weeds without harming the the crop.

Air Products' East Gulf Coast hydrogen pipeline stretches for more than 175 miles from Baton Rouge to Chalmette. The network has 15 hydrogen source points, including the recently built Garyville plant and a Baton Rouge plant to be completed in April 2010, according to the company.

Matt Scallan can be reached at mscallan@timespicayune.com or 985.652.0953.
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