Ruwais Fertiliser Industries (Fertil), a member of the Adnoc Group of companies, and established in October 1980 as a joint venture between Adnoc and TotalFinaElf now boasts 88 per cent of production being exported. 

Construction of a processing plant began in 1980 and production started in December 1983. The prime objective behind establishing the company was to utilise the lean gas supplied from the onshore fields of Bab, Asab and Thammama-C, to manufacture fertilisers and to market them locally and internationally.
The plant is located in Ruwais Industrial Zone, about 235 km from the city of Abu Dhabi and comprises an ammonia and a urea processing plant with installed ammonia capacity at 1,050 tonnes per day and 1,500 tones per day for urea supported by fully integrated utility units with storage facilities.
The company has been continuously improving its technology and productivity, and today, ammonia production stands at 1,310 tonnes per day and urea 1,850 tonnes per day.
The market for Fertil’s products has expanded considerably since its first shipment. Today 12 per cent of its annual production is marketed locally within the United Arab Emirates and 88 per cent is exported to the Indian sub-continent, Far East, Middle East, Africa, USA and Latin America.
Although Fertil is a profit-driven company, “it has never lost sight of its bigger role in a world whose constantly growing population is striving to increase food production and ward off the face of hunger and famine”, the company claims.
Operations Division
Six departments form the operations division, with the department heads reporting to the Operations Division Manager. This Division is staffed with a team of highly skilled technical personnel whose professional expertise enables the company to achieve the highest international quality standards and ensure smooth operations. The current production levels are well above the design capacity of the plant.
Ammonia Operations
The 1,000 tonnes per day ammonia plant was designed and constructed by Chiyoda Engineering Corporation of Japan, with the process license from industry leaders, Haldor Topsoe. The process license for the carbon dioxide recovery unit is from the Benfield Corporation of USA. The Plant was commissioned in December, 1983 and the hydrogen recovery unit, licensed by M/s.Costain, UK, was later added to the plant in 1988 which enhanced the design of the plant and increased capacity to 1,050 tonnes per day.
Urea / Utilities Operations
The urea plant was designed and constructed by Chiyoda Engineering Corporation of Japan with the process license from Stamicarbon b.v. Of Netherlands. It has a production capacity of 1,500m tonnes per day.
The utilities unit provides the utilities required to support the operations of the ammonia and urea plants and comprises raw water storage and boiled water treatment systems, steam generation package boilers, instrument and plant air systems and all other associated services.
Maintenance
The maintenance department consists of three sections: Electrical and Instruments, Mechanical and Civil and Maintenance Planning. This department’s primary objective is to preserve the physical assets of the company and keep the plant continuously operational with minimum failure with safety and reliability being the keywords.
Condition monitoring ensures timely detection of faults and corrective measures are taken to avoid breakdowns. In addition, preventive maintenance is conducted which eliminates the root causes of failures. The department utilises MAXIMO, a computerised maintenance management system for generating various reports to monitor the maintenance history and cost.
Health, Safety & Environment
Fertil is committed to conduct its activities in a manner designed to minimize health, safety and environmental risks, protect the health and safety of its employees, contractors, customers and the community at large and the environment in which its operational activities are conducted. Fertil continues to achieve excellent records of health, safety and environment performance through the top management’s commitment, leadership and active participation as well as the employees’ dedication to the safety rules and regulations, Fertil has achieved a great safety milestone, 6 million man hours and 7 years without a lost time incident, which has greatly enhanced our reputation as leaders in this region in terms of occupational health, safety and overall HSE performance.
In order to maintain such records, a structured and comprehensive HSE Management System (HSEMS) is adopted by the company to ensure strict compliance of the HSE principles and regulations throughout the company’s operations.
Product Handling and Shipping Operations
Ammonia is stored at -33°C in two atmospheric storage tanks of double walled integrated design, each having a capacity of 20,000 tonnes. Urea, after prilling and cooling, is stored in two giant silos, each having a storage capacity of 45,000 tonnes. They are equipped with a re-claimer and a conveyor system which transports the product to the bagging plant for high-speed packing and onward movement to the freighters docked in Fertil’s own jetty.
The same system is used for bulk handling and loading directly into the ship. Fertil’s jetty is capable of handling simultaneously two ships of 5,000-25,000 dead weight tons. The terminal is equipped with two modern vertical discharge type, dual function, bag and bulk ship loaders, having 100 tonnes per hour and 400 tonnes per hour loading capacity respectively for urea and with a modern ammonia loading arm equipped with a quick release coupling with 500 tonnes per hour loading capacity.
Technical Support
This department plays a vital support role in the fields of process engineering, engineering development, inspection and laboratory services. It provides technical support services to increase the reliability and productivity of the plant with emphasis on safety.
The Process Engineering Section deals with the trouble-shooting of the day-to-day problems, de-bottlenecking of process conditions, etc. It is also responsible for coordination and communication with process licensors, engineering companies and outside agencies. The Engineering Development Section provides the technical expertise required, generally after a detailed study on suitable plant modifications.
The Inspection Section ensures the reliability of plant equipment by close monitoring, using state of the art equipment and techniques. The inspection activities are carried out according to established standards to ensure safety of the personnel, equipment and the environment. The Laboratory Section provides round-the-clock control of product quality, utilizing on-line analyzers and chromatographs, supplemented by regular analysis using state-of-the-art laboratory instruments such as atomic absorption spectrophotometers, gas chromatographs, conductivitimeters, etc.
Finance and IT
This division has a dual function: the first one being financial management such as cost control, preparation of budgets and monthly and annual financial statements for the shareholders. The other responsibility is information systems management which deals with IT services for all the departments in the company.
Finance
This department is responsible for financial planning including preparation of the company’s annual capital and operations budget and the five year business plan in accordance with the company’s overall objectives as well as submitting audited year-end financial statements, based on internationally recognised accounting standards for the Board of Directors approval. The department makes extensive use of the “Oracle Financial” and has an efficient management information system for monitoring and controlling expenditure, revenues and preparation of periodic reports to the shareholders and Fertil management. It is also responsible for disbursement of all company payments to the shareholders, suppliers, contractors and employees as well as receipt of sales proceeds from the customers.
Information systems
This department is the nucleus of all information and data concerning the functions carried out by all the divisions and departments within Fertil. From the time of commissioning the plant in 1983, all the major functions in Fertil such as maintenance management, inventory control, finance, personnel and payroll have been computerised. In addition, the Plant has a TDC3000 process control computer. Fertil keeps upgrading the software and hardware infrastructure. The new IT environment is based on an open system platform. With this system, all PC’s are linked to the servers in the computer room at the Head Office.
Fertil uses state-of-the-art networking technologies to provide the infrastructure for the business and technical application requirements of the Company. Fertil is not far behind in utilising the latest internet technology. It has several major application systems to support the IT requirements of the company’s business such as the finance system, HR management system, procurement and inventory management system and maintenance management system, to name a few.
Human Resources
The management of the company’s most precious asset, its personnel, is the main responsibility of this division. The division comprises four departments: Human Resources, Administration, Training and Career Development and Ruwais Personnel and Administration. It provides the best possible facilities and services to other departments and employees.
In addition to manpower planning, recruitment, selection and staff induction, the HR Department is actively engaged in the maintenance, updating and effective application of the company’s policies and procedures in a fully computerised environment. The newly introduced “HR Access System” facilitates a highly efficient data management and processing of all HR and administration related activities such as employee compensation, leave management, attendance monitoring and control in addition to payroll management, etc.
Administration
The Administration Department’s prime responsibility is to provide and maintain efficient and cost-effective administrative support services to all divisions and departments as well as the development and implementation of company policies, standards and procedures in administrative matters. Its other functions involve enhancing the company’s image through the media, including the coordination of public relations activities with the Adnoc Group and the development of technical housing standards as well as performing services in telecommunications, transportation, travel, hotel accommodation and government relations. Finally, the administration is charged with the key responsibility of taking care of the employees and their families’ welfare in the form of housing, maintenance and regular safety inspections.
Training and Career development
Training and development of the company’s UAE nationals represent a major priority for Fertil’s management. In this regard, the company’s training policy aims to achieve a progressive integration of UAE nationals into its work force through the implementation of a well-structured and systematic training and career development scheme.
This scheme comprises an effective and robust on-the-job training program drawing upon the skills and expertise of senior staff as well as providing outside academic and vocational training courses conducted either locally or abroad. In addition, each year Fertil sponsors a number of its promising UAE nationals at the Higher Colleges of Technology to further their careers by building a solid foundation of theoretical and practical knowledge related to their future jobs.
As of today, a number of our employees are pursuing higher degrees in technical disciplines while others have already graduated from the Higher Colleges of Technology to successfully move into company positions of higher authority and greater responsibility.
Ruwais Personnel
nt primarily takes care of the basic personnel and administration needs in Ruwais, besides performing a liaison function between the head office and Ruwais plant. It is also responsible for all contacts with government authorities in the area.