Is synthetic fertiliser use sustainable? You bet your sweet bippee it is!

Many folks worry about running out of oil and note that currently the food supply is critically dependent on large amounts of synthetic fertiliser that are made from oil. Well actually they are mostly made from natural gas but let us assume that is equivalent to petroleum and that we are reaching the limits of ready availability of petroleum.

Peak oil is the name of the game it seems.

Since about half the food in the world depends upon synthetic fertiliser for its nitrogen this is an important issue of food security, so it is worth pondering on the tricky issue whether we'll ever ran out of synthetic fertiliser?
　
That's where recent news items about an Australian fertiliser venture near massive Victorian brown coal reserves in the La Trobe valley come into the picture .
　
For example today's local Australian newspaper the Age carries a story about a US$1.2 billion deal involving Chinese partners to set up a new fertiliser factory to make urea from brown coal.
The reserves of brown coal in the La Trobe valley are indeed massive and production of fertiliser from this coal has a resource base that extends well into the next century.

Besides that the estimates of fertiliser manufacturing costs for urea from brown coal are said to be US $120 a tonne cheaper than current imports into Australia.

So much for worries about synthetic fertilisers not being a sustainable platform for food security.