Plasma stabilization and improvement in the performance of a nonequilibrium disk MHD generator by a radio-frequency electromagnetic field

By applying a radio-frequency (RF) electromagnetic field, the feasibility of improvement in the performance of a nonequilibrium disk-shaped magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) generator suffering from water vapor contamination in the working gas is investigated with r-/spl theta/ two-dimensional numerical simulations. Attention is paid to the relation between the behavior of MHD plasma in the presence of the RF electric field and the generator performance. The water contamination causes the strongly nonuniform and unsteady plasma, and deteriorates its performance. The fluctuations of the electron temperature and of the ionization degree of seed atoms are found to be suppressed by applying the RF electric field. As a result, the enthalpy extraction ratio and the isentropic efficiency of the generator improve. The ratio of the required additional joule heating by the RF electric field to the thermal input to the generator for the stabilization of the plasma and the improvement in the performance is estimated to be about 0.9%.