title: Solid oxide fuel cell interconnect design optimization considering the thermal stresses.
abstract: The mechanical failure of solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) components may cause cracks with consequences such as gas leakage, structure instability and reduction of cell lifetime. A comprehensive 3D model of the thermal stresses of an anode-supported planar SOFC is presented in this work. The main objective of this paper is to get an interconnect optimized design by evaluating the thermal stresses of an anode-supported SOFC for different designs, which would be a new criterion for interconnect design. The model incorporates the momentum, mass, heat, ion and electron transport, as well as steady-state mechanics. Heat from methane steam reforming and water-gas shift reaction were considered in our model. The results examine the relationship between the interconnect structures and thermal stresses in SOFC at certain mechanical properties. A wider interconnect of the anode side lowers the stress obviously. The simulation results also indicate that thermal stress of coflow design is smaller than that of counterflow, corresponding to the temperature distribution. This study shows that it is possible to design interconnects for an optimum thermal stress performance of the cell.
authors.affiliation: School of Energy Science and Engineering, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, 611731 China.
authors.forename: Min
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.affiliation: School of Energy Science and Engineering, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, 611731 China.
authors.forename: Tingshuai
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: School of Energy Science and Engineering, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, 611731 China.
authors.forename: Ming
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: Department of Energy Sciences, Faculty of Engineering, Lund University, P.O. Box 118, 221 00 Lund, Sweden.
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Andersson
keywords: Finite element method; Interconnect; Optimization; Solid oxide fuel cell; Thermal stresses