• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2012.05a
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• pp.70.1-70.1
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• 2012

In-situ X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and infrared (IR) spectroscopy studies of SOFC cathode materials will be discussed in this presentation. The mixed conducting perovskites (ABO3) containing rare and alkaline earth metals on the A-site and a transition metal on the B-site are commonly used as cathodes for solid oxide fuel cells (SOFC). However, the details of the oxygen reduction reaction are still not clearly understood. The information about the type of adsorbed oxygen species and their concentration is important for a mechanistic understanding of the oxygen incorporation into these cathode materials. XPS has been widely used for the analysis of adsorbed species and surface structure. However, the conventional XPS experiments have the severe drawback to operate at room temperature and with the sample under ultrahigh vacuum (UHV) conditions, which is far from the relevant conditions of SOFC operation. The disadvantages of conventional XPS can be overcome to a large extent with a "high pressure" XPS setup installed at the BESSY II synchrotron. It allows sample depth profiling over 2 nm without sputtering by variation of the excitation energy, and most importantly measurements under a residual gas pressure in the mbar range. It is also well known that the catalytic activity for the oxygen reduction is very sensitive to their electrical conductivity and oxygen nonstoichiometry. Although the electrical conductivity of perovskite oxides has been intensively studied as a function of temperature or oxygen partial pressure (Po2), in-situ measurements of the conductivity of these materials in contact with the electrolyte as a SOFC configuration have little been reported. In order to measure the in-plane conductivity of an electrode film on the electrolyte, a substrate with high resistance is required for excluding the leakage current of the substrate. It is also hardly possible to measure the conductivity of cracked thin film by electrical methods. In this study, we report the electrical conductivity of perovskite $La_{0.6}Sr_{0.4}CoO_{3-{\delta}}$ (LSC) thin films on yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ) electrolyte quantitatively obtained by in-situ IR spectroscopy. This method enables a reliable measurement of the electronic conductivity of the electrodes as part of the SOFC configuration regardless of leakage current to the substrate and cracks in the film.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2010.06a
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• pp.139-139
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• 2010

LSM is widely used as a cathode material in SOFC, because of its high electrochemical activity, good stability and compatibility with YSZ electrolyte at high temperature. However, LSM in traditional cathode materials will not generate a satisfactory performance at intermediate temperature. In order to reduce the polarization resistance of cell with the operating temperature of SOFC system, the cathode material of LSCF is one of the most suitable electrode materials because of its high mixed ionic and electronic conductivity. In this report, cathode material, $La_{0.6}Sr_{0.4}Co_{0.2}Fe_{0.8}O_3$ powder for intermediate temperature SOFC was synthesized by Pechini method using the starting materials such as nitrate of La, Sr, Co and Fe including ethylene glycol, etc. As a result, the synthesized powder that calcined above $700^{\circ}C$ exhibits successfully perovskite structure, indicating phase-pure of LSCF. Moreover, the particle size, surface area, crystal structure and morphology of the synthesized oxide powders were characterized by SEM, XRD, and BET, etc. In order to evaluate the electrochemical performance for the synthesized powder, slury mixture using the synthesized cathode material was coated by screen-printing process on the anode-supported electrolyte which was prepared by a tape casting method and co-sintering. Finally, electrochemical studies of the SOFC unit cell, including measurements such as power density and impedance, were performed.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2002.05c
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• pp.1-5
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• 2002

고체산화물 연료전지는 무공해 고효율의 에너지 발전 장치이다. 연료전지는 형태는 1 세대 알카리형 연료 전지부터 인산형, 고분자전해질형, 직접메탄올형, 용융탄산염형 그리고 3세대인 고체산화물형 연료전지들이 있다. 고체산화물 연료전지는 음극 및 양극 그리고 고온에서 작동되기 때문에 전해질 및 내부연결재 등이 많이 연구 개발되고 있다. 고체산화물 연료전지는 이동형으로부터 소형발전 시스템 및 대형 복합발전시스템에 걸쳐 많이 개발이 이루어지고 있다.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.22 no.5
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• pp.592-598
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• 2011

Electrode of solid oxide fuel cell must have sufficient porosity to allow gas transport to the interface with electrolyte effectively but high porosity has a negative impact on structural stability in electrode support. Thus, the upper limit of porosity is based on consideration of mechanical strength of electrode. In this study, the effect of microstructure of Ni-YSZ anode supported SOFC on the mechanical and electrical property was investigated. LSCF composite cathode and 8YSZ electrolyte were used. The porosity of the anode was modified by the amount of graphite powder and added graphite contents were 24, 18, 12 vol%, respectively. The higher the porosity, the better the electrical performance, $P_{max}$. While the flexural strength decreased with increasing the amount of graphite. But the rate of increase in electrical performance and the rate of decrease in mechanical strength were not directly proportional to amount of graphite. The optimum graphite content incorporating both electrical and mechanical performance was 18 vol%.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2004.04a
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• pp.2070-2075
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• 2004

Performance of a solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) can be enhanced by converting thermal energy of its high temperature exhaust gas to mechanical power using a micro gas turbine (MGT). A MGT plays also an important role to pressurize and warm up inlet gas streams of the SOFC. In this study, the influence of performance characteristics of the tubular SOFC on the hybrid power system is discussed. For this purpose, detailed heat and mass transfer with reforming and electrochemical reactions in the SOFC are mathematically modeled, and their results are reflected to the performance analysis. The analysis target is 220kWe SOFC/MGT hybrid system based on the tubular SOFC developed by Siemens-Westinghouse. Special attention is paid to the ohmic losses in the tubular SOFC counting not only current flow in radial direction, but also current flow in circumferential direction through the anode and cathode.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
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• v.44 no.12
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• pp.720-726
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• 2007

Current collectors of SOFC play a significant role on the performance of power generation. In this study a single cell stacked SOFC was assembled using Ag-mesh as a cathode current collector, and evaluated its performance. No gas leakages of the single cell stack occurred in the tests of gas detection and OCV measurement. The OCV and initial power of the stack were 1.09V and $0.45W/cm^2$, respectively, under the flow rates of air at 2,500 cc/min and $H_2$ at 1,000 cc/min at the test temperature of $750^{\circ}C$. A degradation rate of 44.0% was measured during the prolonged time of 307 h. The relatively low durability of the tested single cell stack was found to be the evaporation of Ag-mesh at the current corrector.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
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• v.52 no.5
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• pp.304-307
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• 2015

To reduce the lateral conduction loss of thin-film-processed cathodes, the microstructure of the thin-film cathode is engineered to contain a denser bridging layer in the middle. By doing so, the characteristic crack-like pores that separate the cathode domains in thin-film-processed cathodes and hamper lateral conduction are better connected and, as a result, the sheet resistance of the cathode is effectively reduced by a factor of 5. This induces suppression of the lateral conduction loss and expansion of the effective current collecting area; the cell performance is improved by more than 30%.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.49 no.6
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• pp.498-506
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• 2016

Electrochemical measurement using a LSCF6428 electrode was performed to estimate the oxygen potential gradient in the electrode layer and a long time stability test was performed by applied potential to learn the overpotential effect on the LSCF6428 electrode. By fitting the observed impedance spectra, it was obtained that the amount of faradic current decreased with distance from cathode/electrolyte interface. Oxygen potential gradient was estimated to occur within 1 um region from the cathode/electrolyte interface at an oxygen partial pressure of 10-1 bar. The segregation of cation rich phases in the LSCF6428 electrode suggests that kinetic decomposition took place. However, impedance response after applying the potential showed no changes in the electrode compared with before applying potential. The obtained results suggest that segregation of a secondary phase in a LSCF6428 cathode is not related to performance degradation for solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs).

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2006.11a
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• pp.364-367
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• 2006

The decrease of polarization resistance in cathode is the key point for intermediate temperature SOFC(Solid Oxide Fuel Cell). In this study, the Influence of Co substitution in B-site at perovskite PSCM (Pr0.3Sr0.7CoxMn(1-x)) was investigated. The PSCM series exhibits excellent MIEC(Mixed ionic Electronic Conductor) properties. The ASR(Area Specific Resistance) of PSCM3773 was $0.174{\Omega}cm^2\;at\;700^{\circ}C$. The activation energy of PSCM3773 was also lower than other compositions of PSCM. The ASR values were increased gradually during the thermal cycling test of PSCM37773 due to the delamination between electrolyte and cathode materials.

• International Journal of Precision Engineering and Manufacturing-Green Technology
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• v.5 no.5
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• pp.637-642
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• 2018

The impact of the sintering process, especially in terms of sintering temperature and sintering aid concentration, on the ohmic transport and electrode performance of $(La_{0.80}Sr_{0.20})_{0.95}CoO_{3-{\delta}}$-gadolinia-doped ceria (LSCF-GDC) cathodes is studied. The ohmic and charge-transfer kinetics exhibit a highly coupled $Co_3O_4$ concentration dependency, showing the best performances at an optimum range of 4-5 wt%. This is ascribed to small grain sizes and improved connection between particles. The addition of $Co_3O_4$ was also found to have a dominant impact on charge-transfer kinetics in the LSCF-GDC composite layer and a moderate impact on the electronic transport in the current-collecting LSCF layer. Care should be taken to avoid a formation of excessive thermal stresses between layers when adding $Co_3O_4$.