Chapter 18 - Inorganic Membrane Reactors for Methanol Synthesis

Abstract

Methanol production is a typical equilibrium reaction system that requires intercooled multistage reactors to achieve higher conversion. Recently, more effort is being spent on methanol production from CO2, as this is a possible solution for CO2 reuse. Also in this case, the reaction system is exothermic and the equilibrium limited. A possible way to improve the process yield is to achieve in situ removal of the methanol produced, thus increasing the conversion per pass. This process intensification can be achieved by integrating membrane separation into the methanol production reactor, realizing a membrane reactor for methanol production and separation. This chapter will describe the inorganic membrane reactors for methanol production. A review of the main literature dealing with methanol production is also presented.