| abstract |
A mixture of alcohols principally comprising methanol and ethanol is produced by reacting carbon monoxide with hydrogen in the presence as catalyst of a supported mixture of a rhodium component and a rhenium component, optionally also containing one or more of the metals iron, manganese, molybdenum, tungsten, ruthenium, chromium, zirconium, uranium and thorium. Support materials include silica, alumina, silica/alumina, magnesia, thoria, titania, chromia, zirconia and active carbon. Typically the reaction conditions are a temperature in the range from 150 to 450 DEG C, a pressure in the range from 1 to 700 bars and a gas hourly space velocity greater than 10<3> vol/vol/hour. |