Design and Preliminary Performance Assessment of a Porous Dielectric Barrier Discharge Reactor for Ammonia Synthesis

Ammonia is the second largest industrial chemical compound, mainly used for agricultural fertilizers. The Haber-Bosh process, the main ammonia production method, relies on large-scale and energy-intensive operations leading to 1-2% of energy consumption and 3% of CO₂ emissions globally. Ammonia synthesis using non-thermal plasma operated at atmospheric pressure conditions could be a viable approach to decarbonize ammonia production, especially in distributed and on-demand operations. The design and characterization of a porous Dielectric-Barrier Discharge (DBD) reactor are presented. The porous DBD reactor design is aimed at plasma catalytic-membrane processes, which allow integrated product separation, enabling process intensification and potentially greater efficiency, while addressing catalyst packing issues commonly faced by packed-bed reactors. The reactor allows three operation modes: conventional DBD with non-porous dielectric, porous DBD with porous dielectric, and catalytic-membrane DBD with porous dielectric loaded with catalyst particles. Reactor characterization and performance assessment without catalyst are presented. Expected operational characteristics are evaluated using computational thermal-fluid modeling together with electrical, optical, and chemical analyses. Ammonia production and process efficiency as function of design and operational parameters are investigated.