The relevance of combustion theory to the homogeneous oxidation of methane

This reaction is a highly exothermic one and as such invariably occurs under conditions of substantial self-heating and consequent self-acceleration. The behaviour described in a number of publications is inconsistent and it is the thesis of the present paper that the nonlinearly flowing from self-heating is responsible for many contradictions and novel results in this area. Appropriate use of combustion theory in the form of thermokinetic modelling not only brings some order to otherwise inexplicable contradiction, but also enables prediction of optimal conditions for methanol selectivity and conversion. The importance of such exotic phenomena as hysteresis and oscillatory reaction for optimisation is demonstrated and some suggestions for future direction are discussed.