Haber Process

The Haber process, also called the Haber–Bosch process, is the industrial implementation of the reaction of nitrogen gas and hydrogen gas. It is the main industrial route to ammonia:

N₂ + 3 H₂ ⇌ 2 NH₃ (ΔH = −92.22 kJ·mol−1)

Despite the fact that 78.1% of the air we breathe is nitrogen, the gas is nutritionally useless. It was not until the early 20th century that Fritz Haber developed the first practical process to convert atmospheric nitrogen to ammonia, which is nutritionally available. Prior to the discovery of the Haber process, ammonia had been difficult to produce on an industrial scale.

Fertilizer generated from ammonia produced by the Haber process is estimated to be responsible for sustaining one-third of the Earth's population. It is estimated that half of the protein within human beings is made of nitrogen that was originally fixed by this process; the remainder was produced by nitrogen fixing bacteria and archaea.