CRU and BC Insight's September 2024 nickel feature projected global sulfur demand for nickel processing to rise to 6.7 million tonnes a year by 2028, largely from Indonesian HPAL ramp-ups. The metals call competed with phosphate for Middle East and Canadian solid cargoes. The piece is at https://www.bcinsight.crugroup.com/2024/09/30/full-speed-ahead-for-indonesian-nickel/.
Six point seven million tonnes a year of nickel-related sulfur by 2028 is in the neighbourhood of Canada's entire recovered output. It is not 2024's market. It is the demand path that 2024's 1.92 million tonne January-July Indonesian sulfur import boom, up 39 percent, was already walking.
Phosphate remains the larger sulfur book. IFA saw MAP and DAP at 66.8 million tonnes in 2024, still below 2020. A nickel path that grows at HPAL speed can still reprice the residual seaborne tonne that phosphate also wants. 2026's rationing, OCP at half rate, Mosaic curtailed, Chinese MAP at 40 percent, is that residual disappearing.
Alberta recovered sulfur still leaves mainly through Vancouver. A 6.7 million tonne 2028 nickel call is a reason forming plants stay relevant even if Florida phosphate affordability caps Tampa. It is also a reason Indonesia's 76 percent Middle East dependence later became a Vancouver opportunity when Hormuz closed.
Tampa $76 in early July 2024 and $116 in Q4, USGS, is the phosphate price path beside this nickel feature. Soft phosphate and booming nickel can coexist in a surplus. They cannot both be fully fed in a 1.9 million tonne 2025 deficit plus a 2026 corridor failure.
About 1 tonne of sulfur to 3 tonnes of acid is the stoichiometry behind the 6.7 million tonne sulfur number. Acid imports into Indonesia falling 64 percent year on year in July 2024 to 64,000 tonnes, as sulfur imports spiked, is the switch from buying acid to burning sulfur.
The 2028 date is CRU's projection in a September 2024 feature. The desk will not treat it as a 2026 print. It will treat 2024's Indonesian import spike as the first step.
Figures follow BC Insight and CRU. Licensed weekly grids are not restated.