Abstract
The effects of heat and mass transfer on the electrochemical reaction in a flat-tube-type solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) are investigated numerically to achieve higher cell performance. The result of the simulation shows that fuel is not sufficiently diffused in the porous media, and this fact causes shortage of the fuel near the three-phase-boundary, and also increased activation and concentration overpotentials. When the cell length is shorter, the heat loss at the cell inlet makes the cell temperature level lower, and this results in the increases in both activation overpotential and electrolyte ohmic loss. Improved thermal insulation at the cell inlet keeps the cell temperature homogeneous and higher, and leads to a drastic increase in the cell output voltage.
