Solid Oxide Reversible Cells Using Redox-Tolerant Fuel Electrodes

摘要

In recent years, environmentally-compatible renewable energy becomes increasingly important as major power resources. However, there exist several issues to overcome including energy storage due to the fluctuating nature. Solid oxide reversible cells (SORCs), able to act as both solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) and solid oxide electrolyzer cells (SOECs), may enable power generation in an SOFC mode and hydrogen production in an SOEC mode. Therefore SORCs are of scientific and technological interest towards low-carbon and carbon-free energy society. However, since SORC operation may be associated with redox cycling of their fuel electrodes, the commonly-used fuel electrode material, Ni-zirconia cermet, has a difficulty in stability against such redox cycling. For SOFCs, alternative catalyst-impregnated fuel electrodes are demonstrated to be applicable with long-term durability under high water vapor pressure and against redox cycling. Here, the aim of this study is to investigate the electrochemical properties of such redox-tolerant fuel electrode materials for SOECs and SORCs.