The reduction of nitrogen to ammonia by the Haber-Bosch (H-B) process entails large energy and environmental costs that motivate research on alternative strategies. A major issue with the H-B process is the need for hydrogen gas that currently comes from fossil fuels (steam methane reforming). Plasma activation is a potential alternative as it was historically the first industrial method employed to fix nitrogen, but by oxidation. More recently, plasmas have been combined with solid catalyst materials to reduce nitrogen to ammonia at lower pressures and temperatures than the H-B process, but also use hydrogen gas as a feedstock.
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