A 10 kW high-voltage pulse generator for corona plasma generation

In this article we discuss a 10 kW high-voltage pulse generator for producing corona-induced plasma. The generator mainly consists of a three-step resonant charging circuit switched by thyristors, a transmission line transformer, and a triggered spark-gap switch. Voltage pulses of 30-100 kV with a rise time of about 20 ns, a pulse duration of 50-250 ns, pulse repetition rate of 1-900 pulses per second, energy of up to 12 J/pulse, and an average power of up to 10 kW have been achieved with a total energy transfer efficiency of about 80%-90%. At each frequency, the deviation of the energy per pulse is around 1.0%. Moreover, the generator has been tested for more than 100 h for both industrial demonstrations and laboratory investigations at an average output power of 1-10 kW. (C) 2001 American Institute of Physics.