Development of Multiple Layers Insulation for SOFC

Fuel cells are known as eco - friendly energy facilities that can use heat energy and electric energy at the same time. Fuel cells are classified according to the temperature and material used, and solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) is relatively high temperature ($700-800^{\circ}C$). SOFC requires a hot box consisting of a high temperature stack, a reformer, a burner, and the heat exchangers in order to use energy efficiently. The hot box needs to maintain heat insulation performance at high temperature to reduce heat loss. However, Fibrous insulation, which is widely used, needs to be improved because it has a disadvantage that the thermal conductivity is rapidly increased due to the increase of temperature. Therefore, this study was carried out to develop a thermal insulation, which is applied to multiple layers insulation (MLI) technic, that can be used under SOFC operating conditions and prevent a drastic drop in thermal conductivity at high temperature. The developed insulation is consist of a thermally conductive material, a spacer, and a reflective plate. The thermal conductivity of the insulation was measured by in the thermal conductivity measuring device at high temperature range. As a result, it was confirmed that the developed layers insulation have an good thermal conductivity (0.116 W/mK) than fibrous insulation (0.24 W/mK) as a radiation shielding effect at a high temperature of 1,173 K.

SOFC를 위한 고온용 적층단열재 개발