Peter Harrison's CRU outlook at Sulphur + Sulphuric Acid 2021 predicted the demand rebound would persist into 2022 with China substituting some pyrite-based acid for sulfur burning, and saw prices peaking in first-quarter 2022. The call preceded the actual second-quarter 2022 blow-off that took Vancouver near $478 per tonne FOB. The wrap is at https://www.bcinsight.crugroup.com/2022/01/31/sulphur-sulphuric-acid-2021/.
Tampa had reached about $192 per long ton by mid-June 2021, versus about $83 in early January and $54 a year earlier, BC Insight. Fourth-quarter USGS Tampa near $183 is a plateau, not a peak. A first-quarter 2022 peak call from that plateau was a reasonable conference sentence. USGS's $282 2022 open and $481 early-April peak are why it was early. Conference calls are not USGS prints.
Alberta recovered sulfur still leaves mainly through Vancouver. A peak-in-Q1-2022 call, if believed, would have programmed first-half 2022 stems and paused remelt after. The market programmed first-half stems anyway, at $478 FOB, then crashed. The harbour's 2.79 million tonne 2022 year is that programming. The call's timing error did not idle Canadian logistics. It missed the China-quota crash's delay until July.
China substituting pyrite-based acid for sulfur burning is a domestic sulfur-unit mix shift. Argus's 40 percent Chinese production-growth call toward 2025 is the recovered-sulfur side of the same import-dampening story. 2020's about 3 million tonne import plunge already showed cyclical import intensity can collapse. Harrison's 2022 rebound-with-substitution is the structural overlay.
October 15 NDRC inspections, two weeks after this conference-dated slug, are the policy the peak call did not yet have as a dated fact. DAP rallies and unclear Chinese export restrictions are what Argus would name in November as the firming cause. The conference sat on the hinge.
Indonesia sulfur demand doubling by 2025 and US lithium acid extra 1.2 million tonnes a year by 2030 are the same conference's demand add-ons. Phosphate remained the organizer. Metals were the floor. 2023's 3.5 million tonne nickel-sulfur use would confirm the floor. 2022's crash would confirm phosphate was still the organizer.
Licensed weekly grids are not restated. The first-quarter 2022 peak call is CRU conference language via BC Insight.
Figures follow BC Insight. CRU's Q1 2022 peak call is the 2021 outlook chapter that 2022's $481 April peak and July crash both contradicted on timing.