INTRODUCTION Methanol is an alcoholic fuel which is mainly produced in processes using natural gas. Although methanol can be produced from other materials such as: crude oil, gasoline and buthanol, it is very economic to produce methanol by natural gas. Nowadays, methanol is extensively used as a feed for olefin units in petrochemical plants. On the other hand, large extents of methane are produced during the olefin process which can be used as a feed for olefin units. Methanol is also an important product that is used for preparation of goods and ORIENTAL JOURNAL OF CHEMISTRY www.orientjchem.org ISSN: 0970-020 X CODEN: OJCHEG 2012, Vol. 28, No. (1): Pg. 145-151 Est. 1984 An International Open Free Access, Peer Reviewed Research Journal Simulation of Methanol Production Process and Determination of Optimum Conditions AZAM MARJANI, MASHALLAH REZAKAZEMI and SAEED SHIRAZIAN* Islamic Azad University, Arak Branch, Department of Chemistry, Arak (Iran). *Corresponding author: E-mail: shirazian@iust.ac.ir (Received: April 12, 2012; Accepted: June 04, 2012) ABSTRACT Methanol is one of the most important petrochemical products which is produced in large extents worldwide. Nowadays, it is mostly used as a feed in olefin units for production of synthetic fuels. In this work, methanol production process, under license of Davy Corporation, is simulated by using HYSYS software. The simulations are carried out for steady state condition. The simulation results were compared with experimental data reported in literature and were in good agreement with the experimental values. The simulation results were also used to determine the optimum conditions for production of methanol. The results of this work can be used for reduction of greenhouse gas emission and energy consumption. Key words: Methanol, Davy Mc Kee, Simulation, Optimization. products in chemical industries. It is mainly used for preparation of formaldehydes, MTBE acids, dyes and solvents. Methanol’s derivatives are divided in five main groups. Table 1 shows these five groups 1-3 . As it can be seen from table 1, large amounts of produced methanol are used for production of formaldehydes and MTBE. MTBE is an additive that is used for increasing octane number of gasoline. Methanol also is used as an important material for preparation of many products such as solvents, dyes and plastics.