At the just concluded 2008 National Science & Technology Awards of China, BlueStar Lehigh Engineering Corporation (Lehigh) and BlueStar Changsha Research and Design Institute (CRDI) jointly won the second prize for the "1,000,000 t/a potassium fertilizer technology and commercialization" program.
The program, approved by the former State Planning Commission as a hi-tech demonstration project, is deemed to be one of the ten landmark projects in the country's West Development Endeavor. Harnessing the patented technologies developed independently by the two companies, the facility was engineered and designed by Lehigh and CRDI in collaboration. It was completed in the end of 2003 and went into stable commercial production in 2006, making high quality fertilizers with potassium chloride content reaching 95%.
The success of the project is a testimony to China's potassium chloride production technology and facilities which are now world class. It also indicates further progress made by BlueStar in its R&D and engineering strength and its capability to commercialize research findings.