Development of Lightweight and Compact Air-Independent Planar SOFC for Navy's Undersea Applications

The overall objective of the Phase II effort is to demonstrate a solid oxide fuel cell stack to power unmanned undersea vehicles (UUVs). We will use established and proven solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) technology developed at MSRI to achieve this objective. Based on the success of Phase-I effort, a scaled-up stack of 1~3 kW size with peak power of ~6 kW will be demonstrated. The stacks will be operated on reformate gas as fuel and pure oxygen as oxidant. Several novel cell/stack designs will be investigated in parallel, and promising technologies will be implemented into the final stack design. The stack will be optimized for compactness and maximum performance as well as other requirements such as fast start-up and ability to thermal cycle. A prototype 3 kW stack will be built, and will be integrated with balance-of-plant components for final demonstration of the fully integrated system.