Modelling of a High Temperature Solid Oxide Fuel Cell

Abstract

Solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) has been considered as one of the most efficient power generation devices for the coming decades. There are various physical phenomena appearing in SOFC in multi-length and -time scales, such as multi-component gas-phase species/charge flow, thermal energy and mass transfer. Meanwhile, generation and consumption of gas and surface phase species together with electric current production are involved at various active sites of different components of SOFC.In this paper, a numerical study of the thermal and electrochemical performance of a single Integrated Planar Solid Oxide Fuel Cell (IP-SOFC) has been performed. The numerical modelling considers internal reforming through the methane reforming and water gas shift reactions in a Ni-YSZ anode. Next to the description of the electrochemical reactions, the methane/steam reforming and shift reactions, the heat-transfer and the mass-transfer processes have also been included in the model.

Keywords: Solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC), Integrated Planar Solid Oxide Fuel Cell (IP-SOFC), internal reforming, methane reforming, water gas shift.