Efficient Use of CO2 Reforming of Methane With an Arc-Jet Plasma

Carbon dioxide reforming of methane has drawn the attention of many researchers for years, because of both its theoretical yield of hydrogen to carbon monoxide, i.e., H-2/CO = 1, and the use of greenhouse gas CO2. Although catalytic processes have been widely investigated, plasma-based techniques were recently considered, because catalytic processes have problems, such as coking and slow start-up time. However, since there is a lack of concrete information about plasma-induced processes, we systematically tested a dry reforming of methane by using an arc-jet plasma reactor. The effects of supplied power for plasma generation, CO2/CH4 ratio, O-2 addition, and the amount of CH4 + CO2 in the reactant were experimentally investigated in nitrogen balance. As a result, the H-2/CO ratio of a product can be controlled in the range of 0.8-2.5, and the direction for efficient use of the dry reforming process was proposed. Detailed mechanism and characteristics of the dry reforming of methane were also discussed.