Degradation Of Organic Contaminations From Gas And Liquid Phase Using Gliding Arc Discharge Plasma

The gliding arc (glidarc) discharge is considered to be a non-thermal plasma. Gliding discharge is produced between at least two diverging electrodes and across the flow, self-initiated in the upstream narrowest gap, the discharge forms the plasma column connecting the electrodes. This column is dragged by the flow towards the diverging downstream section. The discharge length grows with the increase of inter-electrode distance until it reaches a critical value. After this point, the discharge extinguishes but momentarily reignites itself at the minimum distance between the electrodes and a new cycle starts. The main advantages of gliding arc discharge are: having a dual character of thermal and non-thermal plasma; inexpensive both from capital and operating costs; The electrodes do not need to be cooled, the discharges perform their own maintenance on the electrodes, preventing chemical corrosion and erosion; the electrical energy is directly introduced into the reaction volume to create a non-equilibrium and very reactive environment for promoting the chemical transformations of interest; any gas, gas-liquid, gas-solid or gas-liquid-solid can be directly processed; any initial gas temperature can be accepted. This paper presents experimental results on the degradation of organic contaminations from gas and liquid phase using gliding arc discharge plasmaFirstly, two plasma generators (gas and gas-liquid gliding arc) are designed in our laboratory with the aim to obtain the physical and chemical characteristics, several diagnostic methods are used (high speed photography with a CCD camera, electric measurements, temperature measurements). Based on physical experimental results and Elenbass-Heller equation, a simple theoretical plasma channel model of gliding arc is given which enables determination of the electronic density and electric field strength. Based on the chemical characteristics of gliding arc discharge and the model of Peyrou R., the chemical kinetics of humid air and gas-liquid gliding arc discharges is modeled. The degradation mechanisms of hydrocarbons with polyfunctional groups like carboxyl-, aldehyde-, ketone- or alkanol- groups are introduced.Laboratory-scale gas glidarc reactors are constructed and used to investigate the effects of operational parameters on volatile organic compounds (VOCs) removal efficiencies. Experimental results of toluene removal indicate that many factors will...