Reaction chemistry and optimization of plasma remediation of NxOy from gas streams

Increasing environmental awareness and regulatory pressure have motivated investigations into energy efficient methods to remove oxides of nitrogen (NxOy) from gas streams resulting from the combustion of fossil fuels. Plasma remediation of NxOy is potentially an efficient removal technique due to the relative ease of generating reactants by electron‐impact processes. Previous works have investigated the use of electron‐beam, corona, and dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) generated plasmas for this purpose. In those works, reduction (N+NO→N2+O) and oxidation (NO2+OH→HNO3) reactions were identified as major removal channels. A computational study of the plasma remediation of NxOy from humid air using repetitively pulsed DBDs is reported. The dominant reaction pathways are discussed and scaling laws are proposed to optimize the energy efficiency of removal. Three reaction periods are identified: the current pulse (during which electron‐impact processes generate radicals), the postpulse remediative period (d...