An innovative in-flight glass melting technology was developed for a purpose of energy saving and environmental protection. Granulated glass raw materials with small diameter were treated by hybrid heating of multi-phase AC arc combined with an oxygen burner. A multi-phase AC arc and hybrid plasma were compared to study the in-flight melting efficiency of the granulated raw materials. The effects of the input energy and the primary size of SiO2 in the glass raw materials on the characteristics of the in-flight melted particles were investigated. The reaction rate inside the individual in-flight particles was enhanced with decreasing the primary size of SiO2 particles, resulting in the more effective in-flight melting by the hybrid plasma. (C) 2012 Elsevier B. V. All rights reserved.