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Research Article | Open Access

Taking advantage of Li-evaporation in LiCoO2 as cathode for proton-conducting solid oxide fuel cells

Yangsen XU, Shoufu YU, Yanru YIN, Lei BI()
School of Resource Environment and Safety Engineering, University of South China, Hengyang 421001, China
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Abstract

LiCoO2, a widely used electrode material for Li-ion batteries, was found to be suitable as a cathode material for proton-conducting solid oxide fuel cells (H-SOFCs). Although the evaporation of Li in LiCoO2 was detrimental to the Li-ion battery performance, the Li-evaporation was found to be beneficial for the H-SOFCs. The partial evaporation of Li in the LiCoO2 material preparation procedure led to the in-situ formation of the LiCoO2+Co3O4 composite. Compared to the cell using the pure phase LiCoO2 cathode that only generated moderate fuel cell performance, the H-SOFCs using the LiCoO2+Co3O4 cathode showed a high fuel cell performance of 1160 mW·cm–2 at 700 ℃, suggesting that the formation of Co3O4 was critical for enhancing the performance of the LiCoO2 cathode. The first-principles calculation gave insights into the performance improvements, indicating that the in-situ formation of Co3O4 due to the Li-evaporation in LiCoO2 could dramatically decrease the formation energy of oxygen vacancies that is essential for the high cathode performance. The evaporation of Li in LiCoO2, which is regarded as a drawback for the Li-ion batteries, is demonstrated to be advantageous for the H-SOFCs, offering new selections of cathode candidates for the H-SOFCs.

Keywords

cathodecompositeproton conductorsolid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs)

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Journal of Advanced Ceramics
Volume 11 Issue 12,
December 2022
Pages 1849-1859
DOI: 10.1007/s40145-022-0651-x
Cite this article:
XU Y, YU S, YIN Y, et al. Taking advantage of Li-evaporation in LiCoO2 as cathode for proton-conducting solid oxide fuel cells. Journal of Advanced Ceramics, 2022, 11(12): 1849-1859. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40145-022-0651-x
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10.1007/s40145-022-0651-x.T001Comparison of performance of current LiCoO2+Co3O4 cathode with other recently reported cathode materials for H-SOFCs

Cell configurationElectrolyte thickness (μm)Cathode compositionPPD (mW·cm–2)Rp (700 ℃) (Ω·cm2)YearRef.
600 ℃650 ℃700 ℃
Ni–BCSF|BCSF|F–BCSF15Ba0.5Sr0.5Co0.8Fe0.2O2.9−δF0.1260—480—2018[34]
Ni–BCZY|BCZY|LSN15La1.2Sr0.8NiO42233304610.262018[35]
Ni–BZCYYb|BZCYYb|NBSCCF–BCZYYb13Nd(Ba0.4Sr0.4Ca0.2)Co1.6Fe0.4O5+δ2175017760.1142019[36]
Ni–BCZY5|BCZY5|CC25Ca3Co4O9+δ1502202900.122019[37]
Ni–BCZY|BCZY|BSSNC32Ba0.5Sr0.5Sc0.175Nb0.025Co0.8O3−δ——6330.172019[38]
Ni–BCZYYb|BCZYYb|SFMZ20Sr2Fe1.5Mo0.4Zr0.1O6−δ—6307900.1692020[39]
Ni–BCZYYb|BCZYYb|PrBaNiMn12Pr2BaNiMnO7−δ57077610700.0842020[40]
Ni–BCZY|BCZY|LSCF–BCZY25La0.6Sr0.4Co0.2Fe0.8O3−δ465———2021[41]
Ni–BCZY|BCZY|LSFN30La0.25Sr2.75FeNiO7−δ219348——2021[42]
Ni–BCZY|BCZY|LCO–Co3O412LiCoO2–Co3O460389611600.0432022This work

Note: BCSF is BaCe0.8Sm0.2F0.1O2.85, LSN is La1.2Sr0.8NiO4, BCZY5 is BaCe0.5Zr0.3Y0.2O3−δ, BCZYYb is BaZr0.1Ce0.7Y0.1Yb0.1O3−δ, NBSCCF is Nd(Ba0.4Sr0.4Ca0.2)Co1.6Fe0.4O5+δ; CC is Ca3Co4O9+δ, BSSNC is Ba0.5Sr0.5Sc0.175Nb0.025Co0.8O3−δ, SFMZ is Sr2Fe1.5Mo0.4Zr0.1O6−δ, LSCF is La0.6Sr0.4Co0.2Fe0.8O3−δ, LSFN is La0.25Sr2.75FeNiO7−δ, and LCO is LiCoO2.