An energy-consumption and byproduct-generation analysis of the discharge nonthermal plasma-chemical NO-reduction process

This study is devoted to an investigation of the energy consumption and byproduct generation of the nonthermal plasma-chemical NO-reduction process. Nitrogen gas with a 200 ppm NO impurity has been processed at a pressure of 1.3 atm in a silent discharge reactor with a gap spacing of 50 µm. Detailed measurements of NO, NO 2 and N 2 O concentrations at the reactor outlet were carried out and analysed by means of the created model. On the basis of the proposed three-collision reaction mechanism of N 2 O generation the byproduct-suppression effect has been predicted and experimentally confirmed. An extremely low energy consumption (less than 150 eV per molecule) for NO reduction by the discharge nonthermal plasma has been attained.