A Numerical Simulation to Understand the Impact of Electrode Porosity on the Performance of Electrolyte Supported Planar Solid Oxide Fuel Cell Under Intermediate Temperature

Abstract

There have been extensive research efforts toward understanding electrode porosity in solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC). Porosity can enhance gas diffusion and reactant transport, enabling better access to the catalytically active sites on the electrode surface. This can lead to improved cell performance and efficiency. The existing analyses are performed considering high-temperature state; however, to the best of our knowledge, there is no such simulation work that considers intermediate temperature to analyze 372 electrode porosity in SOFC. Intermediate temperature can enhance electrode kinetics, material compatibility, reduce material degradation, and thermal stress. In this chapter, a three-dimensional (3D) stationary model has been utilized to analyze porosity effect on SOFC. The model incorporates different equations such as mass, energy, momentum, and charge transport equations. The numerical result shows that both cell current density and average cell power density increase due to the augmentation of porosity in relation with the initial cell polarization and temperature predominantly at intermediate temperature.