Destruction of hazardous air pollutants using a fast rise time pulsed corona reactor
- Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico87545-1663 (United States)
- Southwest Research Institute, 6220 Culebra Road, P.O. Drawer 28510, San Antonio, Texas78228-0510 (United States)
- OSRAM Sylvania, Inc., 71 Cherry Hill Drive, Beverly, Massachusetts 01915 (United States)
- Federal Bureau of Investigation, Engineering Research Facility, MS EST-5, Building 27958-A, Quantico, Virginia22135 (United States)
- Naval Surface Warfare Center, Dahlgren, Virginia22448-5100 (United States)
Increasingly stringent environmental regulation imposed on both the military and civilian sectors has created a growing demand for alternative abatement methods for a variety of hazardous compounds. One alternative, the nonthermal plasma, shows promise of providing an efficient means for the destruction of dilute concentrations of hazardous air pollutants. The Dahlgren Laboratory of the Naval Surface Warfare Center has extensively investigated one type of nonthermal plasma discharge, the pulsed corona reactor, for the destruction of volatile organic compounds and chemical warfare agents. In this reactor, a fast rise time ({approximately}10ns), short duration ({lt}100ns), high-voltage pulse is repetitively delivered to a wire-cylinder electrode geometry, thereby producing a multitude of streamer discharges along its length. The resulting nonthermal plasma contains highly reactive chemical radicals which can interact with and destroy the hazardous molecules entrained in the ambient atmosphere flowing through the reactor volume. Increased electrical efficiency was obtained using a combination of high efficiency constant-current capacitor-charging, high repetition-rate spark gap switching, and resonant energy transfer to the reactor. Promising results have been obtained for toluene, methylene chloride, and dichlorodifluoromethane in air at concentrations of a few hundred parts per million. The device has been operated at voltages up to 30 kV, pulse repetition rates up to 1.4 kHz, and flow rates up to 60 scr(l)/min. Detailed electrical measurements have been made to properly characterize the electrical properties of the pulsed corona reactor and to validate subsequent improvements in the reactor energy efficiency. {copyright} {ital 1998 American Institute of Physics.}
- OSTI ID:
- 627582
- Journal Information:
- Review of Scientific Instruments, Vol. 69, Issue 4; Other Information: PBD: Apr 1998
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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