Microwave sintered nanocomposite electrodes for solid oxide fuel cells

Microwave sintering is a very interesting subject, which provides an alternative method to overcome problems faced with conventional sintering. This process is very efficient and only requires a few minutes. In this paper, nanocomposite electrodes (Cu _0.15Ni _0.85-GDC) were sintered at 700 °C for 10 mins in a single mode 2.45 GHz microwave oven by the solid state reaction method. The composition influence and the sintering methods on the as-obtained powder were characterized by XRD, SEM and TEM. It was observed that excellent sintering took place. Excellent fuel cell performance was achieved with microwave sintering compared to samples sintered using conventional sintering. Electrochemical analysis was carried out using AC Impedance technique. This paper reports a new approach to develop a microwave sintered based nanocomposite material, which is more efficient on time and energy. This method can gain significant economical benefits compared to conventional sintered materials for applications in low temperature solid oxide fuel cells (LTSOFC).