start of the reaction 1 24 30 52______________________________________conversion ofmethanol mol 36 9 34 2 32 6 31 8selectivityto methylformate mol 88 7 91 0 91 9 92 3yield ofmethylformate mol 32 7 31 1 30 0 29 4______________________________________ the basic copper carbonate prepared in example 1 and high alumina cement and alumina cement no 2 calcium aluminate cement produced by denki kagaku kogyo kabushiki kaisha were used in the proportions as given in table 2 the activated catalysts were prepared by following the procedure of example 1 except that the reaction temperature and space velocity of methanol as given in table 2 were employed the results are shown in table 2 table 2__________________________________________________________________________ grams of space cement per reaction velocity number of hours fromkinds of 1 gram atom temperature of methanol start of the reactioncement of copper u00b0 c hr sup 1 1 30 50 75__________________________________________________________________________high alumina 44 2 260 3700 conversion ofcement methanol mol 48 6 35 5 selectivity to methyl formate mol 77 1 85 2 yield of methyl formate mol 37 5 30 2high alumina 22 1 256 3700 conversioncement mol 49 9 38 9 35 7 33 7 selectivity mol 74 9 84 9 86 4 87 1 yield mol 37 4 33 0 30 8 29 4high alumina 11 1 260 3800 conversioncement mol 50 7 38 7 34 9 30 6 selectivity mol 78 9 86.