Partial oxidation of methane using a microscale non-equilibrium plasma reactor

A flow-type, microscale, non-equilibrium plasma reactor was developed for partial oxidation of methane without a catalyst. A wide range of oxygen and methane mixtures was directly processed without dilution or explosion at ambient temperature because the microscale plasma reactor removes excess heat generated by partial oxidation, thereby maintaining a reaction field at temperatures near room temperature. Consequently, the least reactive methane was excited by high-energy electrons, whereas successive destruction of reactive oxygenates was minimized simultaneously within the extremely confined environment. A highly reactive and quenching environment is thereby obtained within a single reactor: these are paradoxical conditions in conventional thermochemical processes. A major product among liquid oxygenates was methanol, whose selectivity reached 34% at 30% of methane conversion. Selectivity of oxygenates such as methanol and formaldehyde depends strongly on the fragmentation pattern of methane dissociation by electron impact. Maximum selectivity of oxygenates, which is estimated from numerical simulation of a filamentary microdischarge, reaches 60% when the applied electric field corresponds to the breakdown field of methane (80 Td, 1 Td = 10(-17) V cm(2)). The discharge current increases markedly with an applied electric field, but the selectivity of oxygenates decreases as the field strength increases. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.