Sign in

Private company

ANSAC

Logo: ANSAC, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons3

American corporation

American Natural Soda Ash Corporation (ANSAC) operates as the international distribution arm for three US manufacturers of natural soda ash produced from trona deposits in Green River, Wyoming, the trade name for sodium carbonate Na2CO3, is an essential raw material used in the manufacture of glass, detergents, and several sodium-based chemicals. The company is headquartered in Westport, Connecticut.2 Wikipedia text CC BY-SA 4.0

Last updated Oct 21, 2026.

Overview

1984Founded1

See how the biggest companies compare on our leaderboards

American Natural Soda Ash Corporation (ANSAC) operates as the international distribution arm for three US manufacturers of natural soda ash produced from trona deposits in Green River, Wyoming, the trade name for sodium carbonate Na2CO3, is an essential raw material used in the manufacture of glass, detergents, and several sodium-based chemicals.2

The story

ANSAC was founded in 1984 as the American Natural Soda Ash Corporation. The company was set up to act as the international sales, marketing and distribution cooperative for the four leading producers of natural soda ash in the United States.

Soda ash commodity

Soda ash is one of the most widely used and important commodities in the United States, contributing substantially to the gross domestic product For this reason, the Federal Reserve Board incorporates monthly soda ash production data into monthly economic indicators used to monitor the condition of the US economy.

The USA is the world’s largest exporter of soda ash and exported over 5 million tonnes in 2008, which accounted for over 50% of the world’s trade in this commodity.

ANSAC today

ANSAC ships soda ash to all areas of the globe except North America and Western Europe. In these areas, the member companies use their own sales and distribution services. Its estimated export volume in 2008 was 4 million tonnes, up from around 3 million tonnes in 2000. These volumes make the company the world's largest exporter of natural soda ash.

The soda ash is moved from the plants in Wyoming in a fleet of 4000 rail cars or 40 unit trains to ANSAC’s dedicated ocean terminals in Portland, Oregon and Port Arthur, Texas.

ANSAC has 6 dedicated vessels, including the ANSAC Kathryn, ANSAC Asia, ANSAC Sesoda, ANSAC Splendor, Jasmine Ace & King Yukon. The company also uses other vessel chartering arrangements to supply customers all around the world.

The Portland terminal is used to supply customers located in the west coast of Latin & Central America, the Middle-East & Asia

The Port Arthur terminal is used to supply customers located in the east coast of Latin & Central America, the Caribbean, Africa, & Eastern Europe

Read the full text

Member companies

The two leading US manufacturers supplying ANSAC with natural soda ash are:

WE Soda

TATA Chemicals (Soda Ash) Partners

These companies mine and process trona into soda ash in the Green River Basin, Wyoming This area contains the largest reserves of naturally occurring trona on earth, with deposits estimated at 100 billion tons The mines and processing plants operate 24 hours per day, year-round Soda ash production is an economic mainstay of the communities of southwest Wyoming, contributing over $300 million annually.

During the processing and production of soda ash, a number of other sodium compounds are made as co-products, including sodium bicarbonate baking soda, sodium sulfite, sodium tripolyphosphate, and chemical caustic soda.

From Wikipedia’s article on ANSAC, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4

Products and brands

Soda ash is made in three main grades - light, medium and dense. These have the same chemical properties and only differ in physical characteristics, such as bulk density and particle size and shape.

ANSAC supplies dense and medium dense soda ash:

Dense soda ash

The dense soda ash exported by ANSAC has the following properties:

Particle size - <75 micrometres

Read the full text

High sodium carbonate content – Purity levels of at least 99.2% and typically 99.8%

Low impurity levels – chloride and iron

Fifty percent of the world-wide production of soda ash is earmarked for soda-lime silica glass manufacture, generally used in the flat glass (automotive and construction), glass container (food and drink), and many other glass industries. The bulk of ANSAC dense soda ash is supplied to this industry.

Medium dense soda ash

The medium dense soda ash exported by ANSAC has the following properties:

Particle size - 150 micrometres 75%

High sodium carbonate content – Purity levels of at least 99.2% and typically 99.8%

Low impurity levels – chloride and iron

Medium dense soda ash dissolves faster than dense soda ash and is typically used as an alternative to Chemical synthesis/synthetic light soda ash in compact detergent manufacture

From Wikipedia’s article on ANSAC, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4

Timeline

  1. 1984Founded Founded1

Sources

The numbers on this page point here. Each one links to the record it came from.

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4