Enhanced Performance of La0.8Sr0.2FeO3-δ-Gd0.2Ce0.8O2-δ Cathode for Solid Oxide Fuel Cells by Surface Modification with BaCO3 Nanoparticles

Halefom G Desta; Yang Yang; Birkneh Sirak Teketel; Quan Yang; Kai Song; Shiyue Zhu; Dong Tian; Yonghong Chen; Tianyong Luo; Bin Lin

doi:10.3390/mi13060884

Enhanced Performance of La_0.8Sr_0.2FeO_3-δ-Gd_0.2Ce_0.8O_2-δ Cathode for Solid Oxide Fuel Cells by Surface Modification with BaCO₃ Nanoparticles

Micromachines (Basel). 2022 May 31;13(6):884. doi: 10.3390/mi13060884.

Authors

Halefom G Desta^{1

2}, Yang Yang³, Birkneh Sirak Teketel¹, Quan Yang², Kai Song², Shiyue Zhu², Dong Tian², Yonghong Chen², Tianyong Luo¹, Bin Lin^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ School of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, School of Materials and Energy, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China.
² Anhui Province Key Laboratory of Low-Temperature Co-Fired Materials, Huainan Normal University, Huainan 232038, China.
³ School of Materials Science and Physics, China University of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou 221116, China.

Abstract

Recently, Fe-based perovskite oxides, such as Ln_1-xSr_xFeO_3-δ (Ln = La, Pr, Nd, Sm, Eu) have been proposed as potential alternative electrode materials for solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs), due to their good phase stability, electrocatalytic activity, and low cost. This work presents the catalytic effect of BaCO₃ nanoparticles modified on a cobalt-free La_0.8Sr_0.2FeO_3-δ-Gd_0.2Ce_0.8O_2-δ (LSF-GDC) composite cathode at an intermediate-temperature (IT)-SOFC. An electrochemical conductivity relaxation investigation (ECR) shows that the K_chem value of the modified LSF-GDC improves up to a factor of 17.47, demonstrating that the oxygen reduction process is effectively enhanced after surface impregnation by BaCO₃. The area-specific resistance (ASR) of the LSF-GDC cathode, modified with 9.12 wt.% BaCO₃, is 0.1 Ω.cm² at 750 °C, which is about 2.2 times lower than that of the bare cathode (0.22 Ω.cm²). As a result, the anode-supported single cells, with the modified LSF-GDC cathode, deliver a high peak power density of 993 mW/cm² at 750 °C, about 39.5% higher than that of the bare cell (712 mW/cm²). The single cells based on the modified cathode also displayed good performance stability for about 100 h at 700 °C. This study demonstrates the effectiveness of BaCO₃ nanoparticles for improving the performance of IT-SOFC cathode materials.

Keywords: BaCO3; Fe-based perovskite oxide; SOFCs; impregnation; surface exchange kinetics.

Grants and funding

This research was funded by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China (A03018023601020), the Key Research and Development Project of Anhui Province (201904a07020002), and the Anhui Provincial Department of Education (gxbjZD2021074).