An electrosurgical system for sealing vessels using capacitive (RF) dielectric heating is provided. The system (6) includes an electrosurgical instrument (10) having an end effector with parallel plate electrodes (2,3) that will clamp onto a vessel and maintain a specified gap distance however, the electrodes will be coated with a non-conductive dielectric material. Such an end effector will ensure that direct conduction between the electrodes does not occur through tissue or fluids and effectively creates a parallel plate capacitor (1) with a dielectric, e.g., tissue and coating, in between the plates. The electrosurgical instrument will be activated with an AC signal at a specified RF frequency, e.g., a Debye resonance frequency, via an electrosurgical generator (7). An effective AC current will flow through the tissue and cause heating due to fictional losses from rotating polar molecules in the tissue.
