Non-destructive diagnosis of solid oxide fuel cell performance and degradation

固体氧化物燃料电池是一种高效的能源转换设备，它利用各种现成的燃料发电，没有雾霾形成的空气污染排放，温室气体排放非常低。雾霾的减少将导致哮喘等呼吸系统疾病的发生和相应的保健费用的减少，这些疾病已被证明是由空气污染引起的。然而，尽管有这些潜在的环境和健康益处，燃料电池的使用仍然受到可靠性和耐久性不足的限制。拟议的研究计划旨在通过更好地了解性能下降的原因来提高固体氧化物燃料电池的寿命和性能。该研究计划研究新技术，以确定固体氧化物燃料电池性能下降的原因。目前燃料电池性能下降的原因很多，在标准的退化研究中很难相互区分，这些研究涉及监测给定工作电压下的电流密度随时间的变化。提出的研究方案利用数值模拟和实验研究的新组合来非侵入性地诊断性能损失的原因。这种诊断是基于识别每种降解模式的各种电化学特征，目的是利用所获得的知识来修改燃料电池的材料和设计，以提高其可靠性和耐久性。固体氧化物燃料电池更长的寿命和更高的性能将反过来导致它们的更广泛使用，从而使加拿大社会从它们的环境和健康优势中享受到更大的好处。

Solid oxide fuel cells are highly efficient energy conversion devices that produce electricity from a variety of readily available fuels with no smog-forming air pollution emissions and very low emissions of greenhouse gases. Reductions in smog would lead to a decrease in the occurrence and corresponding health care costs of respiratory diseases such as asthma, which have been demonstrated to be caused by air pollution. However, despite these potential environmental and health benefits, fuel cells remain limited in their use by insufficient reliability and durability. The proposed research program seeks to improve the lifetime and performance of solid oxide fuel cells by achieving an improved understanding of the causes of performance degradation. The research program investigates new techniques to identify the causes of performance degradation in solid oxide fuel cells. There are currently numerous causes of performance loss in fuel cells, which are difficult to distinguish from each other in standard degradation studies involving the monitoring of current density as a function of time at a given operating voltage. The proposed research program utilizes a novel combination of numerical modeling and experimental studies to non-invasively diagnose the causes of performance loss. This diagnosis is based on the identification of the various electrochemical signatures of each degradation mode, with the goal of using the knowledge gained to modify the materials and design of fuel cells in order to improve their reliability and durability. Resulting longer lifetimes and higher performances of solid oxide fuel cells will in turn lead to their more widespread use, thereby allowing Canadian society to enjoy greater benefits from their environmental and health advantages.