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RESEARCH PAPERS

Modeling of Convective Heat and Mass Transfer Characteristics of Anode-Supported Planar Solid Oxide Fuel Cells

[+] Author and Article Information
Y. N. Magar

Thermal-Fluids and Thermal Processing Laboratory, Department of Mechanical, Industrial and Nuclear Engineering, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH 45221-0072

R. M. Manglik1

Thermal-Fluids and Thermal Processing Laboratory, Department of Mechanical, Industrial and Nuclear Engineering, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH 45221-0072raj.manglik@uc.edu

1

Corresponding author.

J. Fuel Cell Sci. Technol 4(2), 185-193 (Aug 31, 2006) (9 pages) doi:10.1115/1.2713781 History: Received May 19, 2006; Revised August 31, 2006

Abstract

Convective heat and mass transfer in a planar, trilayer, solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) module is considered for a uniform supply of volatile species ($80%H2+20%H2O$ vapor) and oxidant $(20%O2+80%N2)$ to the electrolyte surface with a uniform electrochemical reaction rate. The coupled heat and mass transfer is modeled by steady incompressible fully developed laminar flow in the interconnect ducts of rectangular cross sections for both the anode-side fuel and cathode-side oxidant flows. The governing three-dimensional mass, momentum, energy, species transfer, and electrochemical kinetics equations are solved computationally. The homogeneous porous-layer flow, which is in thermal equilibrium with the solid matrix, is coupled with the electrochemical reaction rate to properly account for the flow-duct and anode/cathode interface heat/mass transfer. Parametric effects of the rectangular flow-duct cross-sectional aspect ratio and anode porous-layer thickness on the variations in temperature and mass/species distributions, flow friction factor, and convective heat transfer coefficient are presented. The thermal and hydrodynamic behavior is characterized for effective convective cooling performance, and interconnect channels of cross-sectional aspect ratio of $∼2–3$ along with relative anode porous-layer thickness of $∼0.5–1.5$ are seen to provide optimal thermal management and species mass transport benefits in the SOFC module.

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Figures

Figure 1

Schematic of a planar solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) configuration, its structural elements, and basic working principle

Figure 2

Schematic of a single-cell SOFC module illustrating the countercurrent fuel and oxidant flow arrangement, geometrical features of its elements, and grid distribution in computational domain

Figure 3

Typical results for mesh-size selection to establish numerical accuracy and grid independence of computations

Figure 4

Relative influence of porous-media modeling schemes (the Darcy-Forchheimer model and Darcy model alone) and the effects of porous material permeability on the flow Nu variation with the duct aspect ratio γ

Figure 5

Thermal boundary condition at heated interconnect-duct interface in a SOFC: (a) wall temperature distribution and (b) comparison of pure duct flow Nu results to SOFC as well as traditional wall boundary conditions

Figure 6

Variation of Nu and (fRe) with aspect ratio of the interconnect channels for fuel (80%H2+20%H2O) and oxidant (20%O2+80%N2) flows

Figure 7

Temperature distribution in the lateral cross section of the anode-supported (λ1=1.0 and λ2=0.05) SOFC with different aspect ratio γ of the interconnect flow ducts: (a) 0.25, (b) 0.5, (c) 1.0, and (d) 2.0

Figure 8

Fuel (H2) mass distribution in the lateral cross section of the anode-supported (λ1=1.0 and λ2=0.05) SOFC with different aspect ratio γ of the interconnect flow ducts: (a) 0.25, (b) 0.5, (c) 1.0, and (d) 2.0

Figure 9

Effect of anode porous-layer thickness on the variation in convective behavior of fuel flow with aspect ratio of interconnect channels: (a) Nu and (b) (fRe)

Figure 10

The effect of anode porous-layer thickness on the temperature distribution in the lateral cross section of the anode-supported SOFC with γ=1.0, λ2=0.05, and fixed ohmic losses: (a) λ1=0.5, (b) λ1=1.0, and (c) λ1=1.5

Figure 11

The effect of anode porous-layer thickness on the fuel (H2) and water vapor (H2O) mass distributions in the lateral cross section of the anode-supported SOFC with γ=1.0, λ2=0.05, and fixed ohmic losses: (a) λ1=0.5, (b) λ1=1.0, and (c) λ1=1.5

Figure 12

Effects of γ and λ1 on the optimal convective thermal-hydrodynamic performance of interconnect flow channels

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