Effect of Flow Channel Design on Planar SOFC Performance

For a planar SOFC interconnect, channel design parameters such as channel width, depth, numbers, wall conditions, etc. are strongly related to the overall cell performance in the way of fuel utilization. Heat and mass transfer rate can be improved by flow mixing enhancement in the properly designed flow channel. In this paper, the influence of flow channel parameters on cell performance in SOFC is discussed. The flow aerodynamic characteristics and friction loss from the bottom surface geometry considered using a three-dimensional computational modeling method. Specially the effect of channel depth and channel mixing on performance and fuel utilization is investigated with an in-depth analysis. As well as a simplified single channel to see the detailed phenomena, an interconnect including whole channels and manifold hole are simulated. The results including a comparison between experimental data and simulation show that to reduce side loss enhanced cell performance with flow and temperature distribution. Based on the result of channel modeling, single cell test with modified design is conducted to achieve performance improvement. This work can be helpful in understanding the channel flow and provide a valuable guideline to channel design for a planar SOFC.