Grain boundary scavenging through reactive sintering of strontium and iron in samarium doped ceria electrolyte for ITSOFC applications

摘要

Lowering the operational temperature of ceria based electrolytes is important for commercialization of solid oxide fuel cells. Here, we report the effect of iron, strontium and iron/strontium co-addition in samarium (20 mol %) doped ceria (SDC) with respect to sintering, microstructural modifications and ionic conductivity. The nanoparticle synthesized through glycine-nitrate combustion method was sintered at 1000, 1200 and 1300 degrees C. An increase in density was observed in iron doped SDC due to viscous flow sintering while co-addition of strontium and iron lead to the reactive sintering at 1300 degrees C by forming a eutectic liquid phase which resulted in the density of 99%. The presence of iron and strontium generated a compensatory tensile strain in the lattice and an enhancement in oxygen vacancy concentration which resulted in higher ionic conductivity. Co-addition of strontium and iron in SDC, not only increases the density but also reduces the activation energy for grain boundary conductivity.