Steam Electrolysis by Proton-Conducting Solid Oxide Electrolysis Cells (SOECs) with Chemically Stable BaZrO_3-Based Electrolytes

摘要

BaZrO_3-based material was applied as the electrolyte for proton-conducting solid oxide fuel cells (SOECs). Compared with the instability of BaCeO_3-based proton-conductors, BaZrO_3-based material could be a more promising candidate for proton-conducting SOECs due to its excellent chemical stability under H_2O conditions, but few reports on this aspect has been made due to the processing difficulty for BaZrO_3. Our recent pioneering work has demonstrated the feasibility of using BaZrO_3-based electrolyte for SOECs and the fabricated cell achieves relatively high cell performance, which is comparable or even higher than that for BaCeO_3-based SOECs and offers better chemical stability. Cell performance can be further improved by tailoring the electrolyte and electrode.