Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFCs) are one of the most promising technologies for the direct and efficient conversion of the energy stored in chemical fuels to electrical power. Wide scale implementation is hampered by the high operating temperature of current SOFCs. To overcoming this challenge we must develop materials that demonstrate high electrocatalytic activity and facile ion and electron transport at lower temperatures. A significant barrier to progress is a lack of experimental techniques that can probe the properties of these materials under high temperate working conditions in both oxidizing and reducing gas environments.In-situ powder neutron diffraction can aid this goal by revealing information relating to structure, the crystallographic location and density of anionic and cationic vacancies, and the isotropic or anisotropic nuclear displacement of these ions. Most powerfully, all of this information is collected in a single experiment over a wide variety of operating conditions. Analysis of these results enables visualization of diffusion pathways in ionic conductors, guiding future material development. This presentation will discuss results from a recently developed in-situ neutron diffraction cell developed for the POWGEN beamline at the Spallation Neutron Source, Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Results will be presented for a variety of materials to demonstrate the versatility of this technique; from oxygen vacancy disordered structures to vacancy ordered structures with associated anisotropic transport.

Visualizing oxygen anion transport in solid oxide fuel cell materials by in-situ neutron diffraction

247th National Meeting (2014)

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