A novel high performance composite anode with in situ growth of Fe-Ni alloy nanoparticles for intermediate solid oxide fuel cells

•A composite anode with endogenous Fe-Ni alloy nanoparticles has been prepared.•The redox reversibility of the anode has been confirmed by XRD.•The Ea of H2 oxidation at the anode is much smaller than that at Ni-YSZ anode.•A ScSZ supported cell achieves MPD of 0.71 Wcm−2 and Rp of 0.16 Ω cm2 at 800 °C.•The single cell shows stable output during 105 h testing at 800 °C 0.7 V in wet H2.

A redox reversible composite anode with Fe-Ni alloy nanoparticles in situ growth on SrLaFeO4-type and LaFeO3-type oxide substrates has been prepared for intermediate temperature solid oxide fuel cell (IT-SOFC) by reducing perovskite precursor La0.4Sr0.6Fe0.75Ni0.1Nb0.15O3-δ (LSFNNb) in wet H2 at 900 °C for 1 h. The anode has shown an excellent electrochemical catalytic activity for oxidation of hydrogen with much smaller Ea (25.1 ∼ 68.9 kJ mol−1) than the value (>160 kJ mol−1) at Ni-YSZ anode. A scandium stabilized zirconia (ScSZ) electrolyte supported SOFC with the anode achieves maximum power densities of 0.71, 0.52, 0.35, and 0.21 W cm−2 at 800, 750, 700 and 650 °C, respectively in wet H2 (3% H2O), and the corresponding Rp of 0.16, 0.21, 0.35, and 0.60 Ω cm2 under OCV. Moreover, the single cell shows stable power output during ∼105 h operation at 800 °C under 0.7 V in wet H2 after a initial degradation, indicating that R-LSFNNb is an excellent candidate as anode of IT-SOFC.

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