Development of a 1kW class anode-supported tubular solid-oxide fuel cell in KIER
1 kW class anode-supported tubular solid-oxide fuel cell (SOFC) stack was fabricated and characterized. For the anode-supported tubular-type SOFC, it is very difficult to effectively collect the electrical current from anode part of the single cell. Therefore, generally very high polarizations are established across the anode tube wall and anode current collector, which leads to a significant decrease in the power density of a single cell. Thus, in this study, in order to reduce the ohmic resistance caused by anode current collectors, a gas supply tube and Ni wires were used as the anode current collectors. Simultaneously, to reduce contact resistance between the anode wall and the anode current collector, Ni felt and Ni paste were used at the interface between the anode tube wall and the Ni wire, respectively, as well as at the interface between the Ni wire and the gas supply tube, respectively. The developed single cell showed a cell performance of 0.60 W/cm2 at 0.7V and 750oC. And then, SOFC bundle was fabricated by using 6 single cells in parallel electrical connections. To supply fuel gas uniformly into single cells within a SOFC bundle, a fuel manifold was designed by adopting a simulation method. Finally, 1 kW class anode-supported tubular SOFC stack was constructed by stacking 20 SOFC bundles in series electrical connections. The developed SOFC stack showed a maximum power of 1.1 kW at 780oC.