Hybrid Electrochemical Deposition Route for the Facile Nanofabrication of a Cr-Poisoning-Tolerant La(Ni,Fe)O3−δ Cathode for Solid Oxide Fuel Cells

The Cr-poisoning of cathode materials is one of the main degradation issues hampering the operation of solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs). To overcome this shortcoming, LaNi0.6Fe0.4O3-δ (LNF) has been developed as an alternative cathode material owing to its superior chemical stability in Cr-environments. In this study, we develop a hybrid electrochemical deposition technique to fabricate a nanostructured LNF-GDC (n-LNF-GDC) cathode with enhanced active reaction sites for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). For this purpose, Fe and Ni cations are co-deposited onto an electrically conductive carbon nanotubes (CNT)-modified GDC backbone by electroplating, whereas La cations are successively deposited through a chemically assisted electrodeposition method. The proposed method involves a low-temperature (900 °C) calcination step of electrodeposited cations which avoids the need of fabricating a GDC diffusion barrier layer which is otherwise needed to avoid the formation of insulating phases (e.g., La2Zr2O7) when...