This contribution focuses on simplification of a reaction scheme for atmospheric pressure plasmas using the elementary effects method which is well established in various fields. The aim is, first of all, to reduce the number of species that have to be included in the model and secondly to reduce the number of reactions by neglecting reactions that are comparably slower in the relevant range of conditions. Such reaction schemes should then enable development of 2D or 3D fluid models of plasma chemistry, which would otherwise be too computationally expensive.