Evaluation and Upscaling of Impregnated La0.20Sr0.25Ca0.45TiO3 Fuel Electrodes for Solid Oxide Electrolysis Cells Under H2O, CO2 and Co-Electrolysis Conditions

Abstract

Recent research into Rh and Ce0.80Gd0.20O1.90-impregnated La0.20Sr0.25Ca0.45TiO3 fuel electrodes for solid oxide fuel cells has demonstrated the high-stability of these material sets to a variety of harsh operating conditions at small scales (button cells with 1 cm2 active area), as well as full commercial scales (100 cm2 cells) in short stacks (5 cells) and full micro-combined heat and power systems (60 cells). In this work, the authors present a comprehensive evaluation of the ability of these novel titanate-based materials to function as fuel electrodes in solid oxide electrolysis cells (SOECs). Short-term and durability testing of button cell scale SOECs, under CO2 and steam electrolysis conditions, highlighted the limited stability of lanthanum strontium manganite-based air electrodes with lanthanum strontium cobaltite ferrite-based air electrodes offering improved degradation. Upscaling of this optimized cell chemistry to a 16 cm2 active area SOEC and testing under CO2, CO2/steam and steam electrolysis conditions demonstrated encouraging performance over a period of ~600 hours.