Hydrodynamic study of a microwave plasma torch

¹ Laboratoire de Physique des Gaz et des Plasmas, UMR CNRS/UPS 8578, Orsay, France
² Instituto de Plasmas e Fusão Nuclear, Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade Técnica de Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal

^a e-mail: llalves@ist.utl.pt

Received: 15 April 2011
Revised: 25 July 2011
Accepted: 3 August 2011
Published online: 28 October 2011

Abstract

A hydrodynamic model was developed to simulate the flow and the heat transfer with the gas/plasma system produced by a microwave-driven (500–900 W at 2.45 GHz) axial injection torch, running in atmospheric pressure helium at 3–9 L min⁻¹ input gas flows. The model solves the Navier-Stokes’ equations, including the effect of the plasma upon the momentum and the energy balance, in order to obtain the spatial distributions of the gas velocity and temperature. The model predicts average gas temperatures of 2500–3500 K, in the same range of those obtained by optical measurements. Simulations show that the plasma influences the gas flow path and temperature, promoting an efficient power transfer.