Carbon Tetrachloride Decomposition by Pulsed Spark Discharges in Oxidative and Nonoxidative Conditions

The estimation of pulsed-spark-discharge efficiency for destroying unwanted stable gaseous impurities is an object of the present study. A laboratory-scale reactor was developed to study the efficiency of pulsed spark discharges (PSDs) for CCl₄ decomposition under oxidative and nonoxidative conditions at atmospheric pressure. In the discharge, chlorine gas was the main product produced from CCl₄ in addition to minor amounts of additional products. These products were the following: 1) C₂Cl₄, C₂Cl₆, and solid deposits containing chlorine and carbon for the inlet CCl₄ + Ar mixture and 2) CO₂ with small amounts of COCl₂ for CCl₄ + O₂ mixture. For both diluting gases, it was possible to reach a high CCl₄ conversion (98% for CCl₄ + O₂ and 93% for CCl₄ + Ar). CCl₄ was chosen as a model substance, because of its simple chemical composition and high stability of its structure. For this reason, the positive result of experiments with CCl₄ gave evidence that using the PSD may be an effective way for the abatement of gaseous pollutant emission.