Morphological of Yttrium Stabilized Zirconia (YSZ) Thin Film of Electrolyte in Solid Oxide Fuel Cell Application

Abstract

Recently, the performance of solid oxide fuel cell is focused on lowering operating temperature (400°C-650°C). To achieve the goal, the thickness of commonly used electrolyte, YSZ was reduced. The dip-coating technique was used for preparing dense YSZ electrolyte thin films on glass substrate. The suspensions were prepared by sol-gel method. Polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and polyethylene glycol (PEG) was used as a ceramic binder and plasticizer, respectively. Crystalline structure and morphology of thin films were analyze by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and Atomic Force Microscope (AFM). The XRD reveals that crystallization of YSZ phase does not occur at any sintering temperature but can only have a small peak at 2θ = 30° as the thickness of layer increase. The roughness and morphology of the film with different thickness were observed. The roughness increased as the thickness increased.