Question

What intermolecular forces are present in `CH_3OH`?

Answer 1

Well, you got hydrogen bound to the VERY ELECTRONEGATIVE oxygen atom....

Explanation:

And in such a scenario where hydrogen is bound to a strongly electronegative element, hydrogen bonding is known to occur….a special case of bond polarity...

We could represent the dipoles as...

`H_3C-stackrel(delta^+)O-stackrel(delta^-)H`

And in bulk solution, the molecular dipoles line up...and this is a SPECIAL case of dipole-dipole interaction, `"intermolecular hydrogen bonding"`, the which constitutes a POTENT intermolecular force, which elevates the melting and boiling points of the molecule.

And so we got normal boiling points of...

`CH_4` `;-164` `""^@C`.

`H_3C-CH_3` `;-89` `""^@C`.

`H_3C-OH` `;+64.7` `""^@C`.

`H_3C-CH_2OH` `;+78.5` `""^@C`.

`H-O-H` `;+100.0` `""^@C`.

Of course, dispersion forces operate between all molecules...but these are not the same magnitude as intermolecular hydrogen bonding....