Bullets:
Artillery shells involve two volatile components: the explosive, and the propellant.
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TNT is in critical shortage in NATO militaries, as decades ago the production of TNT was outsourced abroad for environmental and safety reasons.
But another bottleneck exists for the highest-quality cotton fibers, which are used in propellants. Most of that cotton was sourced from China, who is closely allied with Russia.
Military suppliers are scrambling, to locate alternate sources of high-grade cotton, and to refurbish TNT factories that have been long closed.
TNT also is used in civilian applications, for engineering, mining, and heavy construction. High demands from the defense sector are causing prices to soar for industrial users as well, increasing over four times in the past year.
This is a transcript, for the YouTube video found here:
Report:
Good morning.
We’re very familiar with this issue by now. The supply chains for everything run through China, and this is a critical problem for manufacturers in Western countries who are paying far higher prices for components and parts because of the high tariffs from the trade war. But it’s an existential problem for weapons makers and defense contractors in Western countries, who cannot get key raw materials at all, and who need them to build weapons to sell, and for fighting in Ukraine and in Gaza.
We’re already seeing it in multibillion dollar weapons platforms fielded by the Pentagon, who need China’s rare earth magnets to make the missiles and planes go in the right direction, and the Chinese have cut them off.
But gunpowder has been around for ages, and somehow we need China to make that now too. In Europe, they can’t make enough gunpowder or TNT to supply Ukraine, let alone build up their own stockpiles. The most basic materials typically are sourced from China. European governments desperately need their chemical companies to switch to military production, but there are reasons why Western chemical companies got out of that business a long time ago.
Cotton is one of the bottlenecks here that nobody was paying attention to until recently. There are two volatile components involved in building an explosive shell: the propellant, and the explosive. The propellants come from very high-grade cotton, and most of that comes from China. China is friendly with Russia, so that’s the problem.
The EU has proposed increased defense spending of 150 billion euro, but even if it passes, factories there cannot build weapons for years because of the supply chain problems. Chemical companies use nitrocellulose for civilian applications, but that quality is not military-grade, and the conversion would be technically and legally difficult.
There are very strict rules on the production, and the transport, of the cargoes to build propellants and explosives. The industry generates a lot of pollution, demands a lot of energy, and involves heavy use of acids and dangerous chemicals. So Europe outsourced that industry a long time ago—to China, Turkey, the Balkans, and Ukraine. Now the Ukraine war is placing high demands on artillery producers in particular, with Russia firing off 10,000 rounds a day. Ukraine can’t possibly keep up, and can only answer with 2,000-6,000 per day.
So Europe is trying to reopen plants that were shut down decades ago. It’s almost impossible to build a new plant in Europe because of the regulations and permits, but even opening up old factories doesn’t happen quickly. A French company reopened a plant in Bergerac that closed down in 2007, and it took a year to even get the construction started. It was two years before it was producing again.
That’s one serious challenge, that it just takes a long time to get production going again, even in facilities that previously built these weapons. Another problem is that chemical companies want strong guarantees that they won’t spend a big pile a money to open a plant to make shells and bombs, and then the wars end and they don’t have customers. So firms are demanding long-term contracts. The Belgian government signed a 20-year deal with a company there, which was enough for them to justify new investment. But that was rare. So far there is lots of talk and pledges of higher spending, but very few actual long-term deals signed.
Other companies use TNT to do things besides blowing up other human beings, but even mining and heavy construction companies are seeing their costs blow out because of the shortages caused by the wars. A single 155-mm shell needs about 10kg—that’s over 20 pounds—of TNT, which now costs $45 per kilogram. That’s $450 worth, just for one shell, and remember that Ukraine is going through up to 6,000 shells per day.
And the United States has the same problem the EU has: there has been no TNT produced in the United States for 40 years. And TNT is just half the problem, with high-quality cotton the other, and China makes most of that. NATO countries currently ban most imports of Chinese cotton, but Russia gets all they want.
So that headline there is already misleading: there is not a worldwide TNT shortage. Russia and China are well supplied. The shortages are hitting Western companies and militaries.
Global Ordnance is a defense industry supplier, and previously sourced TNT from a factory in Ukraine. That went offline in 2022, and now they’re scrambling around for new supply.
Before the recent wars, there were two markets for TNT: commercial markets and governments. The requirements for selling to the American government, for example, were far higher, and so were the prices. The packaging and testing are different, and the shipping cost three times as much because they needed to come in on a US-flagged ship, and we don’t have many of those anyway. But now the prices are higher for everybody, quadrupling in four years.
Resources and links:
TNT wanted: Europe’s ammunition push is missing its explosive core
https://www.euractiv.com/news/tnt-wanted-europes-ammunition-push-is-missing-its-explosive-core/
TNT and nitrocellulose shortage: the new challenge for ammunition production
Shell Game: Inside The Worldwide TNT Shortage
https://www.twz.com/land/shell-game-the-worldwide-tnt-shortage
Europe faces shortage of gunpowder and TNT for ammo production – Bloomberg
Europe Is Short of Gunpowder and TNT When It Needs Them Most
Panic and production cuts at Pentagon suppliers as China tightens exports
The Pentagon wants to build millions of drones without Chinese parts. It’s off to a bad start.
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