Development of 2D dynamic model for hydrogen-fed and methane-fed solid oxide fuel cells

A new two-dimensional (2D) dynamic model is developed in Fortran to study the mass and energy transport, the velocity field and the electrochemical phenomena of high-temperature solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC). The key feature of this model is that gas properties, reaction heat, open circuit voltage, ohmic voltage and exchange current density are temperature-dependent. Based on this, the change of gas temperature and related characteristics can be evaluated in this study. The transient performances of SOFC, like heat-up and start-up processes, are therefore assessed accordingly. In this 2D dynamic SOFC model, chemical and electrochemical reaction, flow field, mass and energy transfer models are coupled in order to determine the current density, the mass fraction and the temperature of gas species. Mass, momentum and energy balance equations are discretized by finite difference method. Performance evaluation in current density, electrical efficiency and overall efficiency is conducted for the effects of different operating parameters in SOFC. The present model can serve as a valuable tool for in-depth performance evaluation of other design and operating parameters of SOFC unit, as well as further dynamic simulation and optimization of SOFC as a prime mover in cogeneration or trigeneration system.