Reducing the sintering temperature of solid oxide fuel cells by controlling the shape of ceria-based eletrolyte nanoparticles

Abstract

The development of solid oxide fuel cells operating at intermediate temperature (IT-SOFCs) and using carbonaceous fuels to generate power have been crucial for the widespread commercialization of SOFCs. Gadolinium-doped cerium oxide (CGO) is known to display the desired properties to be used both as a high ionic conductor electrolyte at intermediate temperatures and as an active layer in the anode due to its catalytic properties for the decomposition of fuels containing hydrocarbons. In this study IT-SOFCs were fabricated with highly reactive nanorods of CGO electrolyte powder with shape controlled by a hydrothermal synthesis developed in this project. The tested fuel cell system consists of the CGO electrolyte support, lanthanum strontium cobalt ferrite (LSCF) cathode and Ni/CGO anode. The performance of the cell was evaluated with hydrogen as a fuel and air as an oxidant at temperatures between 500–700 °C, further work will be carried out to evaluated the performance of the cell when operating with natural gas. The experimental results indicate that a high-performance IT-SOFC can be obtained with a relatively low temperature (1.150 􀀀C) two-step sintering of the ceriabased layers.