Hydrogen Production with a Protonic Ceramic Membrane Reactor on Porous Fe-Cr Alloy

Abstract

A metal supported design is desirable for ceramic electrochemical cells because of its robustness. Yet, a strong alkaline character and a refractory nature of the electrolyte material make it challenging to densify onto a steel component. Here we show a metal supported protonic ceramic cell (MS-PCC) concept enabling ∼90% ceramic material savings compared to traditional cell design. The manufacturing route combines wet ceramic processing with sintering and thin film deposition at temperatures below 1000 °C. The critical diffusive elements were sufficiently confined, and the volume variation of the different functional layers was limited to maintain the integrity of the thin film electrolyte. Applied to steam electrolysis for hydrogen production, the MS-PCC enabled a current density of about −0.84 A cm-2 at 600 °C at a terminal voltage of 1.3 V. This concept offers incomparable perspectives for scale-up and opens up a broad range of applications for hydrogen or Power-to-X applications.