Multidimensional flow, thermal, and chemical behavior in solid-oxide fuel cell button cells

The quantitative analysis and interpretation of button-cell experiments usually depends upon assuming isothermal conditions together with uniform and known gas composition within the gas compartments. An objective of the present effort is to develop computational tools to study the validity of such assumptions. A three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model is developed and applied to a particular SOFC button cell, characterizing the fluid flow, chemistry, and thermal transport. Results show that when inlet flow rates are sufficiently high, button-cell data can be interpreted using the commonly used assumptions. However, when flow rates are not sufficient, the assumptions of uniform composition can be significantly violated. Additionally, depending on operating conditions there can be significant temperature variations within the gas compartments and the membrane–electrode assembly.