Methanol Production and Applications: An Overview

The methanol or methil alcohol is the simplest alcohol. It appears as a colourless liquid and with a distinctive smell. Nowadays it is considered as one of the most useful chemical compound. It is a clean-burning fuel. In fact it is considered one of the most promising building block for obtaining more complex chemical compounds such as acetic acid, Methyl Tertiary Butyl Ether (MTBE), dimethil ether, methylamine, etc. The methanol is also considered as a promising clean-burning fuel with an high number of octane. Moreover, the conversion of CO2 to methanol is a promising method to reduce significantly the CO2 emission. It can be used also as convenient energy carrier for hydrogen storage and conservation. Recently, the methanol synthesis is the second source of hydrogen consumption (the highest energy content) after ammonia production via several reaction such as: partial oxidation, steam reforming, autothermal reforming, methanol decomposition or methanol-water solution electrolysis. Furthermore, novel process of micro channel methanol steam reforming and direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) are recent attractive applications of methanol. This chapter is an overview both of the common used feedstocks (natural gases, CO2 or char/biomass) production process to obtaining methanol (included the hystorical production process: the BASF process, also known as "high pressure method" to the ICI process also known as "low pressure method") both of the most innovative trends for industrial application.