Preparation and Electrical Properties of Interconnect Material Made by Substituting Mixed Rare Earth Oxides (Sm₂O₃, Gd₂O₃, Eu₂O₃ and CeO₂) for La₂O₃ in La

Abstract

La1-xCaxCrO3 (0.1≤ x ≤ 0.4) is usually used as interconnect material for solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs). In this paper, composite material, the two-phase mixtures of face-centered cubic fluorite structure CayCe1-yO2-y (0 ≤ y≤ 0.2) and orthorhombic perovskite structure [Sm(Eu,Gd)]1-zCazCrO3 (0 < z < 0.3), was prepared by an auto-ignition process in which mixed rare earth oxides (Sm2O3, Gd2O3, Eu2O3 and CeO2) are substituted for La2O3 in La1-xCaxCrO3. The direct current (DC) four-probe technique measurement indicated that the electrical conductivities of specimens increased along with the increase of Ca2+ content (x), especially when x=0.3 and 0.4. The material (x=0.4, about 94% relative density) showed excellent electrical conductivities of 48 Scm-1 in air and 13 Scm-1 in H2 (purity 99.999%) at 700°C respectively, which is about 3 times as high as that of La0.7Ca0.3CrO3.