A flame fuel cell stack powered by a porous media combustor

A flame fuel cell stack is successfully assembled and operated in this paper. A micro-tubular solid oxide fuel cell (mT-SOFC) stack was directly operated in and powered by a fuel-rich methane flame in a porous media combustor. The combustor consists of a combustion region and a hot zone. The combustion region and the hot zone are connected by an expansion region, which is designed to match the combustion kinetics and the electrochemical kinetics, thereby increasing the fuel utilization efficiency of the stack. With a 36-Al₂O₃-tube stack located in the hot zone, the temperature field and composition distribution were found to be suitable for the operation of high-temperature SOFCs with traditional materials. Four mT-SOFCs are arranged in a parallel configuration and placed in the center of the 36-tube stack, with the power reached 3.6 W at 0.6 V when the fuel-rich methane flame was operated at an equivalence ratio of 1.6. The maximum electrical efficiency was 6% with a fuel utilization efficiency of 23%. The present configuration demonstrated a promising technology for a self-sustained combined heat and power (CHP) system.