NO PRODUCTION IN A GLIDING ARC DISCHARGE

Gliding arc discharges are the subject of renewed interest in applications to a variety of chemical reactions. A gliding arc is created by a weakly ionised gas flowing between two electrodes. These devices can be used in industry mainly for decontamination and general gas treatment. A study of a DC high voltage arc is described on this paper and a theoretical and experimental determination of NO production are given. A comparison between calculated and experimental results show a good agreement. NO is produced by a thermal sweeping effect as a result of a difference between gas flow velocity and arc velocity. The arc is described with a plasma channel model in which the plasma column have a small conductive radius.