Lanthanum oxide-coated stainless steel for bipolar plates in solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs)

Abstract

Solid oxide fuel cells typically operate at temperatures of about 1000 °C. At these temperatures only ceramic interconnects such as LaCrO 3 can be employed. The development of intermediate-temperature solid oxide fuel cells (IT-SOFCs) can potentially bring about reduced manufacturing costs as it makes possible the use of an inexpensive ferritic stainless steel (STS) interconnector. However, the STS suffers from Cr 2O 3 scale formation and a peeling-off phenomenon at the IT-SOFC operating temperature in an oxidizing atmosphere. Application of an oxidation protective coating is an effective means of providing oxidation resistance. In this study, we coated an oxidation protective layer on ferritic stainless steel using a precursor solution prepared from lanthanum nitrate, ethylene glycol, and nitric acid. Heating the precursor solution at 80 °C yielded a spinable solution for coating. A gel film was coated on a STS substrate by a dip coating technique. At the early stage of the heat-treatment, lanthanum-containing oxides such as La 2O 3 and La 2CrO 6 formed, and as the heat-treatment temperature was increased, an oxidation protective perovskite-type LaCrO 3 layer was produced by the reaction between the lanthanum-containing oxide and the Cr 2O 3 scale on the SUS substrate. As the concentration of La-containing precursor solution was increased, the amount of La 2O 3 and La 2CrO 6 phases was gradually increased. The coating layer, which was prepared from a precursor solution of 0.8 M, was composed of LaCrO 3 and small amounts of (Mn,Cr)O 4 spinel. A relatively dense coating layer without pin-holes was obtained by heating the gel coating layer at 1073 K for 2 h. Microstructures and oxidation behavior of the La 2O 3-coated STS444 were investigated.