Fuel Cell Materials Group
- Fundamental Research for Reliability and High Efficiency of SOFC -

In recent years, Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFCs) systems are being introduced in real-houses to evaluate the operation modes and efficiency. To facilitate the market-in for SOFC systems, a reliability of stacks and high efficiency are primarily important. Our group is focusing on the following topics;
1) fundamental research for reliability and long-term stability of SOFC (collaboration with several companies to examine long-term stability and degradation factors for SOFC materials)
2) fundamental research to improve the performance of SOFC materials

For a reliability of SOFC systems, we have measured the impurity concentration levels at cell components coming from gases. By using secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS), we succeeded in determining the concentration of impurities in ppm level. Some key features were extracted from the relation between the impurity concentration and durability for more than 5000 h.

For the improvement of SOFC materials, a wide variety of hydrocarbon fuels are examined on several candidate anode materials. The active parts for electrochemical reaction were analyzed by isotope labeling/secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) techniques. Also, phase change and adsorption species change were examined by Laser Raman spectrometry at gas/metal-oxide interfaces.

(Click to show larger image) Several impurities were analyzed by Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (SIMS) at the cell components of real stack after more than 5000 hours�Eoperation. An increase of Si was observed at the interlayer around cathode/electrolyte interface as a function of operation time, suggesting one of the degradation factors.

Fuel Cell Materials Group

AIST Tsukuba Central 5, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8565 Japan
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