Publication: Fertilizer Sector: Energy Efficiency and Decarbonization (EE&D) Opportunities
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2025-08-06
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2025-08-06
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Pakistan’s fertilizer sector makes a significant contribution to the country’s economy, accounting for approximately 4.4 percent of large-scale manufacturing output and 1 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP). As part of the large-scale manufacturing sector, the fertilizer industry is driven primarily by agriculture, particularly crops. The sector’s reliance on natural gas makes it vulnerable to supply disruptions and price volatility. Consequently, government policies on gas allocation, subsidies, and environmental regulations play a crucial role in shaping the industry’s performance. The production of ammonia, an intermediate product in the manufacture of fertilizer, is a particularly energy intensive value-chain process; natural gas accounts for 70 percent of the total energy consumption in ammonia manufacture with coal, oil, and electricity used in lesser quantities. Overall, more than 9 percent of gas supplied to the industrial sector in Pakistan is utilized by fertilizer industries. Production of urea makes up nearly 70 percent of the fertilizer sector’s output while the rest consists of products such as di-ammonium phosphate (DAP), calcium ammonium nitrate, nitro phosphate (NP), and various mixes of nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium (NPK). According to the country’s latest greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory, emissions from fertilizer production amounts to 7 percent of overall national industrial emissions. Carbon dioxide (CO2) from ammonia production is the main source of direct GHG emissions from the sector however, fertilizer plants capture most of the CO2 for reuse in the manufacture of urea. This note describes decarbonization interventions to improve energy efficiency and reduce emissions in the fertilizer sector while increasing industrial competitiveness and providing wider economic and environmental benefits.
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“World Bank. 2025. Fertilizer Sector: Energy Efficiency and Decarbonization (EE&D) Opportunities. Pakistan Sustainable Energy Series. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/43548 License: CC BY-NC 3.0 IGO.”
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