Comments from Journal of Natural Gas Chemistry

Manuscript number：20060106
Authors：Antonius Indarto,Jae-Wook Choi,Hwaung Lee,Hyung Keun Song
Title：Methane Conversion Using Dielectric Barrier Discharge:Comparison
with Thermal Process and Catalyst Effects
Referee A:

Please further polish the languages of the paper.

Referee B:

Dielectric barrier discharge is an effective and interesting method for

methane conversion. Several research groups have done lots of works in
the field. This paper presented some experiments about methane
conversion via electric discharge process with the title of "Methane
Conversion Using Dielectric Barrier Discharge: Comparison with Thermal
Process and Catalyst Effects". However, as I know, the experiments
showed in the paper have little relativity on dielectric barrier
discharge, it's only the normal electric discharge process. The reactor
of dielectric barrier discharge is slightly different from that of
normal electric discharge process (Please read the relative eferences).
Normally, in the Dielectric Barrier Discharge process, there are
catalysts or other solid materials presented between the cathode and
anode. The reactor showed in the paper is more like a corona discharge
reactor, because no materials are filled between two electrodes and the
catalyst bed is only located in the end of the reactor. Therefore,
whether the author may consider revising the title of the paper. More
over, there some questions derived from the paper:

1.The catalysts prepared in the experiments were only processed by

calcinations without reductive process. So that the metals on the
catalysts showed different values, the Pt and Ru kept mainly Pt0 and
Ru0, and Ni kept Ni2+, respectively. It is meaningless to compare the
catalytic activity, especially the hydrogenation activity of metal and
metal oxide in the discussion section of the paper.

2.In P7, the authors believed that "At a higher flow rate, the
collisions are more effective although the percentage of conversion is
lower, as seen in Figure 4. More numbers of methane molecules are
converted at higher flow rates than that at lower ones.", which is
conflicted with the previous discussion: "Lower flow rates will give
longer chance for the molecules to collide with energetic species, such
as electron.", and the reaction data. As we know, more collisions will
lead to more numbers of methane molecules reacting, and higher
conversion of methane followed. However, the results in Figure 3 showed
that the conversion of methane decreased with the flow rate increasing.
The energy efficiency is mainly depended on the reactor designing.