BackgroundReversible Solid Oxide Cells (RSOCs) represent a high-efficiency energy conversion technology suitable for large-scale storage of intermittent renewable energy. However, when RSOCs operate in high-temperature environments between 700 ℃ and 900 ℃, significant internal temperature gradients tend to be generated, causing thermal stress and performance degradation.PurposeThis study aims to propose a dynamic operation mode based on long-pulse periodic electrolysis to reduce temperature gradients in RSOC stacks.MethodsAn RSOC fuel cell stack operation mode based on long pulse cycle dynamic electrolysis was proposed to reduce the temperature gradient within the fuel cell stack, and the COMSOL software was employed to establish a planar RSOC multi-physics coupled model. Then the effects of different pulse sequences on system temperature, temperature gradients, and hydrogen production rates were analyzed, and compared with experimental results.ResultsResults show that dynamic operation stabilizes system temperature and significantly reduces temperature gradients. At voltages of 1.2 V, 1.3 V, and 1.4 V, temperature gradients decreased by 43%, 44%, and 46% respectively. While pulsed electrolysis reduces hydrogen production rates, the loss remains minimal at lower voltages, with less than 7% loss at 1.2 V.ConclusionsThe results of this study demonstrate that the proposed long pulse cycle dynamic electrolysis based approach can be effectively applied to reducing the temperature gradient within the RSOC fuel cell stack.
Wang et al. (Sun,) studied this question.