High temperature carbon corrosion in solid oxide fuel cells

Operating conditions in a current design for a planar geometry oxide fuel cell plant are briefly reviewed and the danger of encountering “metal dusting” conditions identified. Laboratory tests were designed to produce accelerated metal dusting by exposing heat resisting alloys to a CO–26 H2–6 H2O (vol. pct) gas mixture at 680°C under thermal cycling conditions. The hot gas composition corresponded to ac = 2.9 and an oxygen potential high enough to oxidise chromium and aluminium, but not iron or nickel. The alloys tested included ferritic and austenitic chromia formers and two ferritic alumina formers, all with electropolished surfaces. Thermal cycling of the chromia formers led to oxide scale damage followed by internal carburisation, metal dusting and coking. This failure occurred very rapidly on most austenitic materials (Alloy 800, Inconel 601, 690, 693, Alloy 602CA), but did not commence until after approximately 50 one-hour cycles for the ferritic steel Fe–27Cr–0.001Y (wt %). The alloy with the best performance was Inconel 625, which was still protected by its Cr2O3 scale after 500 cycles. The alumina forming alloys showed superior performance, with no damage apparent after 1200 cycles. Additional tests using ground metal surfaces showed that they were more resistant to dusting in the case of chromia formers, but more susceptible in the case of alumina formers, metal dusting.