Tran Quang Vinh, Shuya Watanabe, Tomohiko Furuhata and Masataka Arai*
The Journal of Mechanical Science and Technology, vol. 26, no. 6, pp.1921-1928, 2012

Abstract : Due to increasingly stringent emission legislation, it is essential to find a solution of eliminating nitrogen oxides (NOx) from diesel exhaust gas. Non-thermal plasma (NTP) approach has been studied for years and has shown advantages. In this study, NOx removal from simulated diesel exhaust gas by a dielectric barrier discharge needle-to-cylinder reactor under room temperature condition is presented. The dielectric barrier consists of a diesel particulate filter (DPF) putting in the discharge field. A simulation gas of N2, NO and O2 combined with particulate matters (PM) was used as the test gas. PM was loaded from a diffusion flame PM generator. The effect of PM and oxygen fraction in exhaust gas on NOx removal characteristics was investigated experimentally. The results showed that PM promoted NOx removal reactions in the barrier discharge field but its effect was dropped following elapsed time. In addition, for PM composition, soluble organic fractions and sulphate were decreased with NOx removal. Besides, the chemical reaction mechanism inside reactor was discussed.

Keyword : Dielectric barrier discharge; Diesel particulate filter; Non-thermal plasma; NOx; Particulate matter