Reticulated vitreous carbon electrodes for gas phase pulsed corona reactors

A new design for gas phase pulsed corona reactors incorporating reticulated vitreous carbon (RVC) electrodes is demonstrated to be effective for the removal of nitrogen oxides from various gas mixtures containing O/sub 2/, N/sub 2/, water vapor and ethylene. The reactor consists of either a Plexiglass or glass cylindrical tube with macro-porous RVC electrodes placed perpendicularly to the cylinder axis. Streamers propagate between the RVC disks providing a uniform exposure of the flowing gas stream to the electrical discharge. This mode of operation provides for convenient reactor scale-up while maintaining the interelectrode spacing in a moderate range, thus allowing scale-up without the need for higher voltage power supplies. It is further envisioned that the reactor can be operated with multiple sets of electrodes placed in series down the length of the reactor in order to facilitate high efficiency removal of air pollutants.