• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.226-240
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• 2023

This paper provides an overview of the trends and future directions in the development of anode materials for solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) using hydrocarbons as fuel, with the aim of enabling a decentralized energy supply. Hydrocarbons (such as natural gas and biogas) offer promising alternatives to traditional energy sources, as their use in SOFCs can help meet the growing demands for energy. We cover several types of materials, including perovskite structures, high-entropy alloys, proton-conducting ceramic materials, anode on-cell catalyst reforming layers, and anode functional layers. In addition, we review the performance and long-term stability of cells based on these anode materials and assess their potential for commercial manufacturing processes. Finally, we present a model for enhancing the applicability of fuel cell-based power generation systems to assist in the realization of the H₂ economy as the best practice for enabling distributed energy. Overall, this study highlights the potential of SOFCs to make significant progress toward a sustainable and efficient energy future.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.401-412
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• 2013

The paper is to study on the simulation of the micro/macroscale thermo-electrochemical model of a single cell of anode-supported SOFC with direct internal reforming. The coupled heat and mass transport, electrochemical and reforming reactions, and fluid flow were simultaneously simulated based on mass, energy, charge conservation. The micro/macroscale model first calculates the detailed electrochemical and direct internal reforming processes in porous electrodes based on the comprehensive microscale model and then solve the macroscale processes such as heat and mass transport, and fluid flow in SOFCs with assumption of fully-developed flow in gas channel. The simulation results evaluate the overall performance by analyzing distributions of mole fraction, current density, temperature and microstructural design in co/counter flow configurations.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2011.11a
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• pp.97.2-97.2
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• 2011

Pt-Ru and Pt-Ni bimetallic catalysts were prepared and tested for heavy hydrocarbon reforming. Metals were supported on CGO($Ce_{0.8}Gd_{0.2}O_{2.0-x}$) by incipient wetness method. The prepared catalysts were characterized by Temperature programmed reduction(TPR). Oxidative steam reforming of n-dodecane was conducted to compare the activity of the catalysts. The reforming temperature was varied from $500^{\circ}C$ to $800^{\circ}C$ at fixed $O_2$/C of 0.3, $H_2O$/C of 3.0 and GHSV of 5,000/h.Reduction peaks of metal oxide, surface CGO and bulk CGO were detected. Reduction temperature of metal oxide decreased over the bi-metallic catalysts. It is considered that interaction between metals leads to decrease interaction between metal and oxygen. On the other hands, reduction temperatures of surface CGO were dectected in the order of Pt-Ru > Pt-Ni > Pt. low reduction temperatures of surface CGO indicates the low activation energy for oxygen ion conduction to metal. Oxygen ion conduction is known as de-coking mechanism of ionic conducting supports such as CGO. In activity test, fuel conversion was in the same order of Pt-Ru > Pt-Ni > Pt. Especially, 100% of fuel conversion was obtained over Pt-Ru catalysts at $500^{\circ}C$.

• 한국연소학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2015.12a
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• pp.189-192
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• 2015

An experimental study was conducted to find the effect of DBD plasma on the flammability limits of inert-gas-diluted fuel. The results showed that the concentration of diluting nitrogen at flammability limit increased when nitrogen-diluted methane and propane were reformed by plasma, while it decreased when nitrogen-diluted ethylene was reformed by plasma. Gas chromatography results suggested that the fuel type dependence of flammability limits is due to the difference in the concentrations of hydrogen and hydrocarbon species in reformed fuel.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.432-438
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• 2007

The reforming process for hydrogen production generates some impurities. Impurities in hydrogen such as $CO_2$, CO, $H_2S$, $NH_3$ affect fuel cell performance. It is well known that CO generated by the reforming process may negatively affect performance of cell, cause damage on catalysts resulting performance degradation. Hydrogen produced by reforming process includes about 2% methane. The presence of methane up to 10% is reported negligible degradation in cell performance. However, methane more than 10% in hydrogen stream had not been researched. The concentration of impurity supplied to the fuel cell was verified by gas chromatography(GC). In this study, the influence of $CH_4$ on performance of PEM fuel cell was investigated by means of current vs. potential experiment, long run(10 hr) test and electrochemical impedance measurement when the concentrations of impurities were 10%, 20% and 30%.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2008.11b
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• pp.2892-2897
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• 2008

Plasma techniques have been proposed to generate a hydrogen enrich gas to investigate a feasibility of plasma techniques on a fuel reforming, we considered a dry reforming and a partial oxidation with methane in the atmospheric pressure. For these experiments, we employed an arc jet plasma reactor. The effects of input power and oxidizer in each process were investigated by product analysis, including carbon monoxide, hydrogen, ethylene, propane, and acetylene as well as methane and carbon dioxide. In both processes, input electrical power activated the reactions significantly. The increased ratio of the carbon dioxide to methane in the dry reforming doesn't affect to a methane conversion, whereas increased ratio of oxidizer to methane in the partial oxidation was very effective for the reaction. Moreover, for a simultaneous treatment of methane and carbon dioxide, a feasibility of a dry reforming combined with partial oxidation also has been investigated.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2009.06a
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• pp.731-734
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• 2009

KIER has been developed a compact and highly efficient fuel processor which is one of the key component of the residential PEM fuel cells system. The fuel processor uses methane steam reforming to convert natural gas to a mixture of water, hydrogen, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and unreacted methane. Then carbon monoxide is converted to carbon dioxide in water-gas-shift reactor and preferential oxidation reactor. A start-up time of the fuel processor is about 1h and CO concentration among the final product is maintained less than 5 vol. ppm. To achieve high thermal efficiency of 80% on a LHV basis, an optimal thermal network was designed. Internal heat exchange of the fuel processor is so efficient that the temperature of the reformed gas and the flue gas at the exit of the fuel processor remains less than $100^{\circ}C$. A compact design considering a mixing and distribution of the feed was applied to reduce the reactor volume. The current volume of the fuel processor is 17L with insulation.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.304-312
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• 2002

In this study, the performance of the $5Nm^3/hr$ compact type steam reformer which was developed for application of fuel cell or hydrogen station was evaluated in terms of gas process efficiency. For these purposes, reforming efficiency and total efficiency with system load change were analyzed. The reforming efficiency was calculated from the total molar flow of hydrogen output over total fuel flow input to the reformer and the burner on the higher heating value(HHV). In the case of the total efficiency, recovered heat at the heat recovery exchanger was considered. From the results, it was known that system performance was stable, because methane conversion showed the a slight decline which is about 2% though increasing system load to full. Reforming efficiency was increased from 20% to 58%, respectively as increasing system load from 10% to 90%. It was found that total efficiency was higher then reforming efficiency because of terms of heat recovered. As a results, it was known that total efficiency was increased form 75% to 83% at the 10% and 90% system load, respectively. From these results, it is concluded that compact steam reformer which is composed of stacking plate-type reactors is suitable to on-site hydrogen generator or to fuel cell application because of quick start within 1 hr and good performance.

• 한국전기화학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2003.07a
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• pp.89-95
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• 2003

Fuel processing is an enabling technology for faster commercialization under lack of hydrogen infrastructures. It has been reported that the development of novel catalysts that are active and selective for hydrocarbon reforming reactions. It has been realized, however, that with pellet or conventional honeycomb catalysts, the reforming process is mass transport limited. This paper reports the development of catalyst structures with microchannels that are able to reduce the diffusion resistance and thereby achieve the same production rate within a smaller reactor bed. These microchannel reforming catalysts were prepared and tested with natural gas and gasoline-type fuels in a microreactor (1-cm dia.) at space velocities of up to 250,000 per hour. These catalysts have also been used in engineering-scale reactors (10 kWe, 7-cm dia.) with similar product qualities. Compared to pellet catalysts. the microchannel catalysts enable a nearly 5-fold reduction in catalyst weight and volume.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2010.11a
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• pp.111.1-111.1
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• 2010

This paper focuses on a systematic configuration of steam reforming fuel processor, particularly designed for small and medium sized hydrogen production application. In a typical integration of the fuel processor, there exist significant temperature gradients over the entire system which has negative effect on both catalyst life-time and system performance. Also, the volumetric inefficiency should be avoided to obtain the possible compactness for the commercial purpose. In the present work, the computational analysis will be performed to gain the fundamental insight on the transport phenomena and chemical reactions in the reformer consisting of preheating, steam reforming (SR), and water gas shift (WGS) reaction beds in the flow direction. Also, the fuel processing system includes a top-fired burner providing necessary thermal energy for endothermic catalytic reactor. A fully two-dimensional numerical modeling for a integrated fuel processing system is introduced for in-depth analysis of the heat and mass transport phenomena based on surface kinetics and catalytic process. In the model, water gas shift reaction and decomposition reaction were assumed to be at equilibrium. A kinetic model was developed and then computational results were compared with the experimental data available in the literature. Finally, the case study was done by considering the key parameters, i.e. steam to carbon (S/C) ratio and temperature. The computer-aided models developed in this study can be greatly utilized for the design of advanced fast-paced compact fuel processors research.