Towards plasma-enhanced gasification: investigating free-burning carbon arcs in molecular gas mixtures - dataset

A pre-study of free burning arcs between carbon electrodes for potential use in gasification processes is presented. Free-burning arcs offer the potential to be used without additional gas feed or significant changes to gas flows in established gasification systems as well as with minimal cooling requirements for improved energy efficiency. Direct current (DC) arcs with currents up to 200 A and power levels up to 40 kW have been operated in molecular gas mixtures of H2, CO and CO2. The electrical characteristics and dynamic behaviour of the arcs under various electrode configurations have been analysed, along with an assessment of electrode erosion. Finally, concepts for the power sources have been deduced and tested.