An Experimental Investigation on Simultaneous Effects of Oxygen Ratio and Flow-Rate in SOFCs Performance Fueled by a Mixture of Methane and Oxygen

Abstract

Catalytic partial oxidation (CPOX) has recently received particular attention because it is one of the most attractive technologies for the production of syngas and hydrogen in small to medium scales. Current study subjected to partial oxidation reforming which have simultaneously studied the effect of the fuel composition and flow rates of methane-oxygen mixed gas on the SOFCs performances. In this regard, the Reynolds number at the fuel channel inlet represents the mixture of methane and air mass flow rate. Moreover, the amount of oxygen ratio indicates the fuel composition. The results showed that the peak of power density (PPD) strongly depends upon both the Reynolds number at the fuel channel inlet and oxygen ratio. However, with the changes in Reynolds number or oxygen ratio, the oscillating behavior of PPD was observed. A dimensionless parameter can be introduced to take into account simultaneously the effect of oxygen ratio and Reynolds number of fuel on the PPD value. Considering the risk of carbon deposition as a constraint for selecting of oxygen ratio, the highest PPD corresponds to the methane/oxygen flow rates of 100/20 ccm for the applied methane/oxygen flow rates. The electrochemical experimental testing showed a stable performance of the SOFC in this condition and confirmed its durability after 120 hours testing.

Keywords

• solid oxide fuel cells (sofcs)
• catalytic partial oxidation (cpox)
• methane
• direct reforming
• reynolds number