Preserving a Kinetically‐Metastable Nanophase by Limited Calcination for High‐Performance Protonic Ceramic Cells
Abstract
ABSTRACT Sluggish oxygen reduction/evolution reactions (ORR/OER) at the air electrode critically limit the efficiency of reversible protonic ceramic cells (r‐PCCs), yet conventional high‐temperature calcination of the air electrode leads to undesired surface passivation, while low‐temperature calcination leads to insufficient crystallization, both of which severely impair electrocatalytic activity. Here we employ a thermally‐limited calcination process to kinetically retain a nanophase in the air electrode that only forms at a selected calcination temperature (termed “metastable”), thereby forming rich heterointerfaces for active ORR/OER. Specifically, controlled calcination temperature induces selective Ce incorporation into the host lattice of Ba(Co,Fe,Y)O 3‐δ while preserving the metastable BaCeO 3 ‐related nanophase. This nanostructure enriches oxygen‐vacancy‐related defects, accelerates surface exchange and bulk diffusion, promotes proton incorporation, and improves thermomechanical compatibility with the electrolyte. The as‐developed electrode (BaCo 0.6 Fe 0.2 Y 0.1 Ce 0.1 O 3‐δ ‐BaCeO 3 ) exhibits a low resistance of 0.38 Ω cm 2 at 550°C. Single cells with this electrode deliver a high peak power density of 1.44 W cm −2 at 650°C and an electrolysis current density of −2.47 A cm −2 at 1.3 V. These findings establish a promising strategy of thermally‐limited calcination for designing high‐performance reversible protonic ceramic cells.
Article Details
Authors (13)
Yue Pang
College of Life Science, Liaoning Normal University, Dalian, China.
Hangbin Lin
State Key Laboratory of Intelligent Construction and Healthy Operation and Maintenance of Deep Underground Engineering Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Deep Earth Sciences and Geothermal Energy Exploitation and Utilization Shenzhen Key Laboratory of Deep Underground Engineering Sciences and Green Energy College of Civil and Transportation Engineering Shenzhen University Shenzhen China
Kuiwu Lin
Junbiao Li
Ling Fu
Ruiwei Ding
State Key Laboratory of Intelligent Construction and Healthy Operation and Maintenance of Deep Underground Engineering Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Deep Earth Sciences and Geothermal Energy Exploitation and Utilization Shenzhen Key Laboratory of Deep Underground Engineering Sciences and Green Energy College of Civil and Transportation Engineering Shenzhen University Shenzhen China
Shiyin Tang
State Key Laboratory of Intelligent Construction and Healthy Operation and Maintenance of Deep Underground Engineering Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Deep Earth Sciences and Geothermal Energy Exploitation and Utilization Shenzhen Key Laboratory of Deep Underground Engineering Sciences and Green Energy College of Civil and Transportation Engineering Shenzhen University Shenzhen China
Haojie Zhu
Engineering Research Center of Advanced Rare Earth Materials, Department of Chemistry
Zhipeng Liu
Yuan Zhang
Zongping Shao
Heping Xie
Bin Chen