RF Inductively Coupled Plasma Converts Carbon Dioxide

Carbon dioxide,widely existing in the atmosphere,is the largest carbon source and one of main greenhouse gases.Therefore,the transformation of carbon dioxide is of great importance both for environmental protection and for the full utilization of resources.However,carbon dioxide is a high thermal stability molecular.Thus,the traditional thermal CO2 conversion approaches is usually faced with the excessive energy consumption.As a novel method for carbon dioxide conversion,non-thermal plasma can excite molecules by vibrational excitation at room temperature.Currently,non-thermal plasma attracts more and more research interests.I studied the carbon dioxide transformation in a home-built radiofrequency inductively coupled plasma reactor.The effects of supplied power and argon on CO2 decomposition are investigated respectively.The dependence of emission spectrum and conversion on supplied power are discussed.The results show that increasing the power can effectively improve the conversion of carbon dioxide.The effect of electron temperature(Te)on conversion and emission properties is studied.The plasma parameters are measured by optical emission spectrometers,mass spectrometer and Langmuir probe.To understand better the source of C2 molecules and high intensity of CO optical emission,I carried out a comparative experiment between CO and CO2.In addition,the CO2-H2 and CO2-CH4 mixture gases plasma are investigated,respectively.It has been studied that the influences of H2/CO2 ratio and reaction time on the carbon dioxide conversion.The effects CH4/CO2 ratio on methane reforming with carbon dioxide are studied as well.