Member Info for chilting

I may have egg on my face over this one but it looks like Navion Oceania may be with AK by tomorrow morning.

She doesn't have a destination up and logic says she is on her way to Alvheim but I think that Alvheim may be having a maintenance break at the moment.

Also there is a tanker for a STS due at Scapa Flo on Friday.

Currently hook up would be from the south east.

https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/centerx:1.8/centery:59.9/zoom:8

That interesting because my 15 out of 150 is also 10% and yes it is good Cheddar from North Devon.

I reckon that if the transmission is "lubricated" by money off vouchers Ocado will gain far more custom than they will loose from very loyal Waitrose customers.

The only question is - will customers miss Waitrose products and jump ship?

So I put myself in that position, as a customer, and looked at my stored favourite products on Ocado - of the 150 products only about 15 were Waitrose products and most of them were everyday products - easy to switch to the proposed basics range - the only one I would certainly miss was Cheddar Cheese so a store Waitrose visit would be necessary for that one - other than that no problem.

£750 million new investment for an up and coming world class tech company - what's not to like !!!

Ona point of interest the last load is still on the move aboard British Reliance - she is currently heading for the Suez Canal - if the Orkney Harbour Authority is correct her eventual destination is an Indian port.

Petroatlantic and Petronordic are both Teekay tankers Kraken - but they only service Foinaven to the west of Shetland.

This isn't looking good - it could be Stena Natalita Therapist but she usually goes to the smaller oil fields.

Also the possible STS at Sullom Voe turns out to be a regular transfer of crude from the terminal.

Will keep looking and update but Stena Natalita is the only candidate at the moment.

None of the ICL Polysulphate range is the same as Poly4 so it is not possible to make a direct comparison.

The more sophisticated mixes in the range - ICL PKpluS™- use the same sort of coating technology to prevent caking as Poly4 but they don't use starch. These products are produced at a Dutch factory.

ICL are probably the world leader when it comes to fertiliser coatings - Osmocote for example has two coatings to allow fertiliser release over a period up to 24 months depending on the formula.

One thing's for sure - every decision that ICL is made for their own self interest and in that way they are entirely predictable - if they can buy polyhalite for £1 a tonne cheaper from SM than they can mine it from Boulby, then Boulby will be history.

Scotman
Such a leap by SM could only be done by acquisition and even then it would be very difficult to find a competitor to ICL who would have the same market presence and experience. Also such an operation would be direct competition to many of SM's customers and potential customers - we may have to be content with the mining operation and Poly4 - hopefully Poly4 with a few variants.

No - AK still needs to be fixed.

Thorpe
"Will SM eventually become some kind of subsidiary operation to ICL?"

I don't think that ICL would ever want to own SM it would create far to many complications for them. There highest profit margins come from fertiliser manufacture not from mining. If they owned SM they would have a lot of their competitors as customers or potential customers for raw polyhalite - a real conflict on interest.

Myo
So the simple answer, I think, is that ICL will probably continue to operate Boulby until their is an economic case for not doing so - they may even get polyhalite from Boulby and SM for a while to satisfy their demand.

Myo
The main advantage that ICL have with polyhalite is that they have the potential to use it in nearly all their very extensive product range. At the moment they are holding back because of supply issues. This is a very important point because it illustrates the versatility of polyhalite to a fertiliser manufacturer. This range includes controlled release fertilisers such as Osmocote - the typical wholesale price for 25kg of Osmocote is £99.45+vat - so you can see that the margins can be massive.

ICL clearly need new resources to continue fertiliser manufacture of their high end products - polyhalite ticks all the boxes - add to that plentiful supply - assuming they can source it for Boulby or SM - and all they have to do is add Nitrogen and Phosphorus - both in plentiful supply.

ICL are the world leader in high end fertilisers and clearly want to maintain that role, as such they may never be a direct volume competitor to SM and in my view should be regarded as a very valuable potential customer for raw polyhalite.

Myo
It begs the question - can ICL actually produce enough Polyhalite at Boulby to satisfy the growing demand for Polysulphate?

Eureka
Yes, very interesting - Andrew Fulton talks about access to new resources of Polyhalite and he also says that ICL want eventually to grow production to 3 million tpy.

Is Boulby actually capiable of producing 3 million tpy of polyhalite ???

The hook up would be before then - also the tanker might increase speed.

I do hope that Scott Spirit is with AK on Wednesday morning.

Just a snipet - there is an excellent candidate for a STS heading for Sullom Voe at the weekend.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-47357565

Fully accepting the antipathy here towards ICL - which I share - the fact is that if they do reach their target of 1 million tpy for polysuphate by 2020 it will be an excellent achievement and a very full endorsement of Poly4.

So what does this mean for the future and what plans do ICL have - bearing in mind that they have major environmental restraints in Israel for their Potash supply?

Personally I think that they will be looking to establish a major new facility on Teesside to develop Polysulphate, they will close Boulby and use SM as a supplier - they could even become SM's biggest customer after ADM.

The margins for the polysulphate range are very substantial compared to raw polyhalite. Also if ICL were linked into SM via a conveyer the cost saving compared to road haulage from Boulby would also be significant.

So, putting aside the antipathy maybe their might be a massive advantage for both companies to work together with maybe even transfer of experienced miners from the Boulby mine to SM.