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5 PROBLEMS & ISSUES TO

BE ADDRESSED

rom the foregoing sections, the following issues have emerged which need to be
Faddressed to produce methanol/DME by eco-friendly and economic means.
1. At present, India has huge shortage of methanol in the country, therefore, the question
of producing DME in those plants is rather difficult.
2. Majority of the units for methanol production are gas based and due to shortage of gas
availability, industry is exploring coal based units for methanol production.
3. India has many coal based thermal power plants and several of them are using modern
gasifiers but practically none of them are operating under IGCC mode, although some
of them are operating with combined cycle. Hence there is no availability of syngas from
these power plants.
4. India has a large number of small and medium size biomass gasifiers, which operate for
generation of power or heat energy. Only a few large biomass co-gasifiers have come up
recently for producing power and some of the smaller ones are operating via gasification.
5. India has a large number of micro to medium size anaerobic digesters which produce
methane rich gas. This biogas is generally used for lighting or directly for combustion.
It is possible to divert the surplus gas for gasification and DME production, provided
sufficient quantity of such gas is available.
6. Refineries in India have an ever increasing demand of hydrogen and this is met by
natural gas or naphtha reforming. There is a possibility of producing methanol from these
plants provided surplus syngas is available.

7. Most of the refineries produce some disposable residue and many of them make petcoke,
which is sold. There is a good case to use this coke and residue for production of hydrogen
and syngas for methanol production. However, very often the total availability of feedstock
is lower than the desired economic size for IGCC plant. Some large refineries are now
planning for coke based IGCC plants to dispose the coke and residue and to produce
hydrogen and or methanol. Another good option is to co process petcoke and high ash
coal together for large methanol plant.
8. The coke oven and blast furnace gases from steel industry contain hydrogen and carbon
monoxide respectively. Most of them are currently used for heating within the plant itself.
If economics permit these could be utilized for methanol production.
9. Technology to produce hydrogen from the quenching section in steel plant by Thermo
Splitting of water is available indigenously. This is a novel technology and could provide
a good source for hydrogen [76].
10. Traditional chlorine production by electrolysis is associated with hydrogen generation,
which does not have much use by the chlorine industry. However, many of them produce
hydrochloric acid.

78 Methanol and DME Production: Survey and Roadmap | 2017