J056051 Kinetic Monte Carlo Simulations of Microstructural Evolution in Solid Oxide Fuel Cell Cermet Anode

The electrochemical performance of a solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) is strongly linked with the evolution of an anode microstructure that is composed of a porous Ni-YSZ cermet. In particular, Ni coarsening is widely recognized phenomena which may lead to the loss of SOFC performance during long-term operation at high temperature. In this study, we have performed three-dimensional kinetic Monte Carlo (kMC) simulations based on a two phase Q-state Potts model in order to numerically predict the microstructural evolution of the complicated cermet anode during operation. Ni coarsening was captured by incorporating the three distinct kinetic algorithms: grain growth, pore migration and pore annihilation. The starting configuration of each simulation was taken from the experimentally reconstructed Ni-YSZ cermet structure using a dual beam FIB-SEM measurement. Our calculations reveal that the triple-phase boundary (TPB) length because of the constraint effect of the YSZ phase. This trend quite agrees with recent experimental measurements, which support the validity of our numerical modeling.