South Korea advances green ammonia as Ulsan becomes a regional energy hub

South Korea is rapidly turning Ulsan into a live testbed for the ammonia economy, with a pair of firsts underscoring how quickly the country is building the infrastructure needed to move low-carbon fuels from production to use at sea.

In March, LOTTE Fine Chemical said it had completed what it described as the world’s first commercial cross-border import of green ammonia, bringing cargo from Envision Group in China into its Ulsan terminal, which it says is the largest ammonia storage facility in Asia. Less than a month later, the Ulsan Port Authority reported another milestone: the first port-to-ship ammonia bunkering operation involving a gas carrier, supplying fuel to Exmar’s new vessel Antwerpen.

The bunkering operation used about 600 tonnes of ammonia for a 45,000-class dual-fuel gas carrier built by HD Hyundai Heavy Industries, according to marine industry reports. That sequence matters. The import demonstrated that a commercial green ammonia supply chain can work across borders; the bunkering showed that the fuel can then be handled and delivered in the port environment as a marine energy source.

Ulsan has been positioning itself for this role for some time. The port has already carried out the world’s first methanol bunkering demonstration and simultaneous LNG bunkering operations for car carriers, giving it a practical base for alternative-fuels operations that many ports are still designing on paper. For shipowners, terminal operators and fuel suppliers, such operational experience is increasingly as important as access to supply.

The cargo imported by LOTTE Fine Chemical originated at Envision’s Chifeng Net Zero Industrial Park in Inner Mongolia, which the company says is powered by wind and solar energy and integrated with battery storage and predictive systems to support continuous production. Envision says the site was formally commissioned in July 2025 and is now producing 320,000 tonnes of green ammonia a year, with plans to raise output to 1.5 million tonnes annually by 2028.

The scale is notable because the economics of green ammonia have long depended on whether production, transport and end-use could all be proven at commercial scale. Envision’s founder and chief executive, Lei Zhang, said the shipment shows that “scalable, green alternatives are now real and operational” and argued that green hydrogen is essential to any credible net-zero pathway.

For LOTTE Fine Chemical, the strategic logic is just as clear. The company says the imported ammonia will support demand for carbon-free energy applications, including bunkering, co-firing in power generation and use as a hydrogen carrier. Its broader aim is to become a major clean ammonia hub in Asia, leveraging Ulsan’s port infrastructure and storage capacity to link upstream producers in the region with industrial and maritime customers.

That ambition reflects a wider shift in industrial decarbonisation: ammonia is moving from a commodity mainly associated with fertiliser and chemicals into a candidate fuel and energy vector. For shipping, it offers one route to lower-carbon operations, though the technology remains in its early commercial phase and questions around safety, handling and lifecycle emissions still shape deployment.

Still, the recent activity in Ulsan suggests the market is shifting from demonstration to system building. One cargo alone will not establish a new fuel economy, but a commercial import, storage at scale and port bunkering in quick succession point to something more significant: an emerging value chain that links renewable power in China, terminal infrastructure in South Korea and maritime fuel demand in the region.

For now, South Korea appears determined to stay at the centre of that effort.