Accomplishments, Status, and Road Map for the US Department of Energy's Fossil Energy SOFC Program

Development of electric power generation technology that efficiently and economically utilizes coal and natural gas while meeting environmental requirements is of crucial importance to the United States. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Fossil Energy (FE), through the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL), is leading the research and development of advanced Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFC) as a key enabling technology. This work is being done in partnership with private industry, academia, and national laboratories. Program participants are making significant progress toward commercialization. Milestones include: the development and validation of multiple generations of engineered seal concepts, cells with low degradation and high power density, development of integrated stack and system modeling tools, and validation of low-cost stainless steel interconnect solutions. With advances in cost reduction, the program is now focused on research to improve durability and reliability, especially in an integrated realistic system context. Integrated system tests at larger scales (10-100 kWe) are yielding respectable degradation rates in the 1 to 1.5%/1,000 hrs under cost-effective operating conditions. In this presentation, these highlighted accomplishments will be reviewed along with the status of the program and a road map for the future.