Nonstationary effects in ozone generation by barrier discharges in N2/O2 mixtures

Abstract

The yield of ozone in barrier discharges in oxygen–nitrogen mixtures containing 0.001 to 40% of nitrogen is investigated experimentally. Phenomena of the nonstationarity of processes of ozone generation that differ from the known ozone-zero phenomenon (OZP) apparent in the reduced efficiency of ozone generation in very high purity oxygen at long periods (from hours to tens of hours) of ozonator operation are found. It is established that the characteristic times (from minutes to tens of minutes) of ozone attaining stationary values after changes in the discharge parameters indicate slow adjustment of the surface condition of insulators and thus the heterogeneous decay of ozone to more rapidly changing flows of neutral and charged particles from gas discharge plasma on the surfaces of dielectrics. The possibility of such a scenario is confirmed using a new analytical approach and numerical calculations of the plasma–chemical kinetics of N2/O2 mixtures presented in the accompanying theoretical study.