Solid State Ionics 132 (2000) 241–251

www.elsevier.com / locate / ssi

Nickel coarsening in annealed Ni / 8YSZ anode substrates for solid

oxide fuel cells
In memoriam to Professor H. Tagawa

D. Simwonis, F. Tietz*, D. Stover

¨
¨ Werkstoffe und Verfahren der Energietechnik 1 ( IWV-1), Forschungszentrum Julich
Institut f ur ¨ ¨
, D-52425 Julich, Germany
Received 24 December 1999; accepted 15 February 2000

Abstract

In order to study the nickel coarsening in porous Ni / 8YSZ anode cermets of solid oxide fuel cells (SOFC), a series of
exposure tests was carried out with anode substrates used in SOFC development at the Research Centre Julich. ¨ The changes
in electrical conductivity as well as in the microstructure of the material were investigated. The microstructure of the cermets
was characterized by digital on-line image analysis and microstructural parameters were determined for the metallic and the
ceramic phase as well as for porosity. A decrease of 33% of the initial electrical conductivity was measured after exposing
the cermet in Ar / 4% H 2 / 3% H 2 O at 10008C for 4000 h, which is linked to the agglomeration of the metallic particles of this
material. The durability of anode cermets for operations of up to 40 000 h was estimated on the basis of the measured grain
coarsening and the decrease of conductivity. The microstructural parameters — like volume fraction, particle and pore size
— were used to model the electrical conductivity by theoretical microstructure–property relationships.  2000 Elsevier
Science B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Nickel; Coarsening; Ni / 8YSZ anode cermets; Solid oxide fuel cells

1. Introduction operation have become more and more important.

Besides the development of materials for solid
oxide fuel cells with respect to higher electrochemi-
cal performance, long-term stability and low oper-
ating temperatures, the mechanisms of microstruc-
tural changes in the electrodes as well as the
chemical aging processes occurring during SOFC
*Corresponding author. Tel.: 149-246-161-5007; fax: 149-
246-161-2455.
E-mail address: f.tietz@fz-juelich.de (F. Tietz).
With increasing cell, stack or power-plant operating
times the degradation rates attract a high level of
interest and the understanding of the changes in the
SOFC components is a major goal for improving
service time.
Degradation problems in long-term operation of
SOFCs are characterized by a steady decrease in
performance of the fuel cell system, usually in the
range of several per cent per 1000 h of operation [1].
The causes are multifarious and concern all the
components of the fuel cell: (i) formation of pyroch-

0167-2738 / 00 / $ – see front matter  2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PII: S0167-2738( 00 )00650-0
242 D. Simwonis et al. / Solid State Ionics 132 (2000) 241 – 251
lore compounds at the cathode / electrolyte interface
[2,3] or slow densification of the porous cathode
structure [3], (ii) decrease in ionic conductivity of
the solid electrolyte (8 mol% Y 2 O 3 -stabilized zir-
conia, 8YSZ) due to phase instabilities [4,5], (iii)
agglomeration or coarsening of Ni particles in the
Ni / 8YSZ anode cermet [6], (iv) corrosion of the
metallic interconnect [7–9], and (v) chromium
evaporation from Cr-containing interconnect or con-
tact layer materials [10,11]. The decrease in cell or
cell stack performance can be regarded as the sum of
all aging processes, but the extend to which these
single processes contribute to this performance deg-
radation has not yet been definitely clarified.
The predominant microstructural change in the
anode material — a porous cermet made of Ni and
8YSZ — is the agglomeration and particle coarsen-
ing of the metallic Ni. It is widely assumed [6,12–
18] that the agglomeration of Ni in SOFC anodes,
because of its poor adhesion to the ceramic material,
leads to reduced three-phase boundaries (TPB),
which are the chemically active areas of fuel gas
oxidation, then to the reduction of electrical path-
ways in the cermet and finally to increasing over-
potentials and losses of power output.
In this paper, the coarsening of Ni particles in
porous anode substrates, developed at Research
¨
Centre Julich [19], is quantified to evaluate the
lifetime of this component as a current collector and
to correlate the changes in electrical conductivity
with the microstructural parameters.
2. Experimental
2.1. Sample preparation and experimental setup
The anode substrates were produced by uniaxial
pressing of a powder mixture composed of 56 wt%
NiO and 44 wt% 8YSZ prepared by the coat-mix
process [20]. The green samples were sintered in air
at 14008C and finally reduced in an Ar / 4% H 2
atmosphere at 9008C to obtain the Ni / 8YSZ cermets.
The samples were exposed in an Ar / 4% H 2 / 3%
H 2 O atmosphere at 10008C for 1000, 2000, 3000 and
4000 h. After each exposure time the effective
electrical conductivity of the cermets was measured
between 20 and 9008C by the four-point DC tech-
nique. The specimens were connected with Pt wire
and paste. Contacted samples were not used for
further exposures.
The microstructure of the cermets was examined
on the basis of ceramographic cross-sections. To
avoid damage during grinding and polishing, which
may lead to misinterpretations of the porosity, the
samples were infiltrated by an epoxy resin (Araldit,
Ciba-Geigy). After hardening of the resin, the grind-
ing step was carried out with SiC paper and water for
cooling. For polishing, diamond pastes with 6, 3 and
1 mm particles were used together with a lubricant
¨
(Mastermet, Buhler).
Because of the extremely high back-scattering of
light of the Ni particles and the insufficient differ-
ence in gray-scale value it has not been possible so
far to distinguish between porosity and 8YSZ
[20,21]. For that reason the polished surface of the
cermet cross-section was sputtered with an interfer-
ence film of Fe 2 O 3 , which decreases the high
contrast of Ni and enables the discrimination of all
phases. Fig. 1 shows the cross-section of a Ni / 8YSZ
cermet with such an interference film (upper left),
whereas the other three binary pictures show the
segmented phases of the cermet. Also, the gray-value
histogram (Fig. 2) of the sputtered cross-section
indicates that a good separation of the cermet phases
was achieved. The thickness of the interference layer
is very important for getting high contrast between
the various phases. If it is too thin the brightness of
the Ni particles is too high and disturb the contrast
between YSZ and pores, if it is too thick the contrast
between Ni and YSZ is reduced and the the two
phases cannot be clearly separated due to the similar
brightness.
A microscope (Axiomat, Zeiss) equipped with a
high-resolution digital camera (Siemens K300) and
an imaging system (KS400, Kontron Electronics)
was used to generate the digital images from the
polished cross-sections. With this system an optical
resolution of 250 nm was achieved and the images
were digitized into pixels with 255 different gray
values (0 for black and 255 for white pixels, see
Fig. 2).
2.2. Quantitative image analysis
Objects or phases can be detected and separated
from their matrix on the basis of their gray-scale
values. After certain threshold values have been
 D. Simwonis et al. / Solid State Ionics 132 (2000) 241 – 251
Fig. 1. Cross-section of a cermet (upper left, white: Ni, gray: YSZ, black: pores) and separation into the individual phases which appear
white in the binary pictures.
Fig. 2. Gray-value histogram of a Ni / YSZ cross-section. Ni, YSZ
and pores are properly separated and can be segmented (gray
value 05black, gray value 2555white).
defined — in this case the minimums in Fig. 2 — the
resulting image is converted into a binary black and
white image and contains only the selected objects or
phases for further investigation.
The segmented phases are now analyzed with
243
various sequences of functions and commands of the
KS400 software package, the so-called ‘macros’,
which can be individually generated for the specific
investigation. In this case the field- and object-spe-
cific parameters summarized in Table 1 were mea-
sured for each of the three phases in the cermet. The
determination of the particle and pore sizes is
especially important for the correlation between
microstructure and electrical conductivity. A special
problem arises here: whereas the particle sizes of the
Ni can be easily determined by the diameter of the
area-analogue circle (command DCIRCLE), the po-
rosity and the YSZ form a continuous network (Fig.
1) from which no reasonable data can be obtained
with the DCIRCLE command. To get a direct
comparison of all the phases, the intercept lengths
were measured in the x and y direction (commands
FERETX and FERETY). For these commands paral-
lel lines are superimposed on the binary images (Fig.
1) and the intercept lengths of the lines are mea-
sured.
A typical sequence for the determination of the
particle size distribution by image analysis is shown
in Fig. 3. After segmentation of the gray values and
discrimination of the other phases, a frame is defined
244 D. Simwonis et al. / Solid State Ionics 132 (2000) 241 – 251
Table 1
Measured field and object specific parameters
Field specific parameters
FLDCOUNT Number of detected and measured objects
FLDAREA Area of all objects within the defined image area
FRAMEAREA Area of the defined image under investigation
FLDAREAP Total area of all objects related to the area of the defined image area
Object specific parameters
which always has the same area (80 3 100 mm) and
which is the investigated area of the actual image.
For statistical reasons the objects touched by the
frame are filtered in such a way that on two edges
they are included in the investigation and on the
other two edges they are excluded. Therefore the
frame has to be somewhat smaller than the initial
picture. The third step is the coloration of individual
particles and their counting. This procedure is ac-
ceptable for Ni, but for the other two networks the
result would be too large particles and a corre-
spondingly low number. Therefore an additional
function, the introduction of parallel lines at a
distance of about 10 nm, is introduced and the
intercept lengths in the x and y directions are
measured instead.
For statistically reliable data more than 3000
particles were counted and analyzed in the case of Ni
and the DCIRCLE command, whereas about 32 000
intercept lengths were collected and considered for
determination with the FERETX,Y command. For the
determination of the phase fractions, six to ten
different regions of each sample were analyzed. Only
particles larger than 0.35 mm were counted due to
the optical resolution of the hardware system. To
obtain the real mean particle sizes from the image
analysis data, the values for the intercept lengths of
Ni (l i,Ni ) were multiplied by the factor 1.56 as
derived in Ref. [22] for spherical particles and the
intercept lengths of 8YSZ and pores (l i,YSZ , l i,p ) by
1.13 for equiaxed but irregularly shaped grains
according to the ASTM standards [23].
3. Results
In Fig. 4, the effective electrical conductivity
(seff ) of the anode substrate is plotted as a function
of temperature. The conductivity of the cermet
decreases with temperature due to the metallic
conductivity of the Ni. It is 4100 S cm 21 at 208C,
3900 S cm 21 at 258C and about 3500 S cm 21 at
508C. The decrease is steeper from 208C to about
4008C than from 400 to 9008C due to the ferromag-
netic–paramagnetic transition of the metallic phase
[24,25]. At 9008C, the conductivity is 650 S cm 21 .
This corresponds to a decrease of 84% compared to
the electrical conductivity measured at room tem-
perature. The reproducibility in this measurement is
in the range of 2% between various samples.
The decrease in electrical conductivity with expo-
sure time at room temperature is shown in Table 2.
The percentage decrease amounts to 10.3% of the
original value after 1000 h of exposure, 19.2% after
2000 h, 25.6% after 3000 h, and 33.3% after 4000 h.
The values for 1000 and 2000 h represent the mean
 D. Simwonis et al. / Solid State Ionics 132 (2000) 241 – 251 245

Fig. 3. Scheme of how to determine the particle size distributions by image analysis. Top row: image of the cermet; second row: binary
images of each phase; third row: definition of a frame for analysis; fourth row: detection, counting and individualization by coloration of
single particles; fifth row: generation of intercepts by equi-distant parallel lines; sixth row: particle size distributions generated by intercept
lengths or by area-analogue circle diameters (for Ni only).
246 D. Simwonis et al. / Solid State Ionics 132 (2000) 241 – 251

Fig. 4. Effective electrical conductivity of the anode cermet as a function of temperature.

Table 2
Effective electrical conductivity at room temperature (seff,RT ), measured intercept lengths (l Ni ) and corrected average Ni diameter (d Ni ),
measured standard deviation s(l Ni ) and number of measured particles for the anode cermet prior to and after exposure in Ar / 4% H 2 / 3% H 2 O
at 10008C
Exposure time seff,RT seff, l Ni s(l Ni ) d Ni d Ni Number of
(h) (S cm 21 ) decrease (%) (mm) (mm) (mm) increase (%) Ni particles
0 3900 – 1.31 0.84 2.04 – 3421
1000 3500 210.3 1.48 0.97 2.31 13.2 2850
2000 3150 219.2 1.55 1.02 2.42 18.6 2590
3000 2900 225.6 1.60 1.08 2.50 22.5 2267
4000 2600 233.3 1.65 1.19 2.57 26.0 2151

of two measurements. Two experiments were carried
out for these annealing times. The spare samples
were exposed in the same furnace as the first samples
to check the reproducibility. The deviation of the
percentage decrease is 1%.
In order to explain this decrease in electrical
conductivity, the microstructure of the exposed cer-
mets was investigated by means of ceramographic
cross-sections. Considering the samples exposed for
0 and 4000 h, it seems that only Ni becomes coarser
(Fig. 5). The particle size distribution of Ni is shifted
towards larger Ni particles with increasing exposure
time (Fig. 6). The average Ni diameter increases
from about 2 to 2.6 mm after 4000 h of annealing
(see Table 2). Another parameter which quantifies
this statement is the number of Ni particles measured
(see Table 2). Under the same measuring conditions
3421 Ni particles were examined prior to exposure
and 2151 after 4000 h. The form factor (see Table 1)
of the Ni particles was also determined. It is 0.75
prior to exposure and 0.79 after 4000 h (0: elongated
objects, 1: circular objects).
The 8YSZ particle size distribution did not show
any changes with exposure time (Fig. 7). The 8YSZ
network is isotropic, composed of fine particles of
about 1.2 mm and remains stable for up to 4000 h of
exposure. Concerning the pores, slight coarsening
takes place during the first 2000 h of exposure. The
average pore diameter increases from 1.6 to 1.74 mm
and then remains constant up to 4000 h (Fig. 8). The
pore network is coarser in comparison to the YSZ
network.
Finally, the area fractions of Ni, 8YSZ and pores
were measured by image analysis. Since the material
is isotropic, which has been checked by image
analysis on cross-sections in various directions and
 D. Simwonis et al. / Solid State Ionics 132 (2000) 241 – 251
Fig. 5. Microstructure of anode cermet after reduction (left) and after an exposure for 4000 h in Ar / 4% H 2 / 3% H 2 O at 10008C (right).
Fig. 6. Ni-particle size distribution (FERETX) of anode cermet as
a function of exposure time. The symbols correspond to measured
values, the lines are curves through the measured data.
Fig. 7. YSZ-particle size distribution (FERETX) of anode cermet
as a function of exposure time. The symbols correspond to
measured values, the lines are curves through the measured data.
247
Fig. 8. Pore size distribution (FERETX) of anode cermet as a
function of exposure time. The symbols correspond to measured
values, the lines are curves through the measured data.
which is confirmed by similar FERETX and FERE-
TY values, it is expected that the area fraction of a
phase also corresponds to its volume fraction.
Figs. 1 and 3 show that each individual phase is
separated in white color by using the gray-scale
image (Fig. 2) from the other two phases, which can
be regarded as a black background. However, the
‘valleys’ between the three peaks in Fig. 2 are rather
broad and the setting of the boundaries is still
influenced by the personal impression of the operator
and the resolution of the system. Therefore the
sequential analysis of the three phases gives three
area values which should sum up in the ideal case to
100%, but due to the experimental uncertainties it
248 D. Simwonis et al. / Solid State Ionics 132 (2000) 241 – 251
might give slightly different sums of the total area
fractions than 100%.
The Ni area fraction was found to be 23%, the
8YSZ area fraction 35% and the pore area fraction
37%. The theoretical volume fractions were calcu-
lated from the composition (40 vol% Ni, 60 vol%
8YSZ) and the sample density (fraction of porosity)
and amount to 24% for Ni, 36% for 8YSZ and 40%
for the porosity. The sum of the area fractions gave
only 95% due to the independent phase determi-
nation. Comparing the expected and measured per-
centages, an experimental error of about 62% can be
estimated, which can be regarded as more reliable
results than previous microstructural investigations
of anode substrates [20,21]. The area fractions
measured and the volume fractions calculated are
comparable, but the fractions determined by image
analysis showed usually slightly smaller values than
the theoretical volume fractions, probably because,
due to the resolution limit of the optical microscope,
particles smaller than 0.35 mm cannot be determined
in these measurements.
4. Discussion
The results of the image analysis, i.e. the increase
of the particle size and the form factor as well as the
reduction of the counted particles, show that the Ni
particles tend to circularity and minimization of their
surface energy with the exposure time. This tendency
to agglomeration and grain coarsening leads to a
decrease in electrical conductivity. Although with
2600 and 410 S cm 21 at room temperature and
9008C, respectively, the conductivity remains at a
high and sufficient level even after 4000 h of
exposure at 10008C, it would be interesting to know
if the anode cermet can serve as a current collector
after 40 000 h of operation. For such a rough
estimation, it is assumed that the grain growth
follows the equation:
d 3 2 d 30 5 kt (1)
known as Ostwald ripening, in which d is the
average grain size, d 0 the average grain size at time
t50 and k is a constant [26]. In fact, by plotting the
four particle size values a straight line is obtained.
The extrapolated particle size resulting for t540 000
is then 4.2 mm. Due to the few data points for the
particle size dependence of the electrical conduc-
tivity it is not clear whether these data should be
extrapolated by a parabolic or linear fit. In any case,
the failure of the component, i.e. s 50 S cm 21 , is
reached somewhere between 3.0 and 3.35 mm.
Therefore, it can be estimated that the anode cermet
can only serve as a current collector for up to
12 000–19 000 h. However, it should be emphasized
that the data basis is rather poor, that all effects
during operation (like a constant electrical field) are
neglected and that these data hold only for exposure
and service temperatures of 10008C. Since an oper-
ating temperature in the range of 700–8008C is
envisaged, the reliability of the component is con-
siderably longer than 15 000 (64000) h. In fact, a
preliminary result of an exposure at 8008C for 1000
h did not result in any change in conductivity or in
microstructure.
Nowadays various models are described in the
literature to simulate the transport properties of
multi-phase materials, mainly two-phase materials
[27–32]. Most of them take into account only the
volume fractions and additional parameters for fitting
the experimental data are needed. An interesting
approach was reported by Mizusaki et al. [29], who
related conductivity data of specimens after different
heat treatments with the shape and the interconnec-
tion of the resulting grains [33]. Also in this case an
empirical fit parameter is needed to describe properly
the microstructure–property relationships. In these
models usually a homogeneous microstructure is
assumed and no microstructural parameters like
intercept lengths or grain anisotropies are considered.
To prove the validity of a model without micro-
structural parameters for the anode substrates, the
electrical conductivity was calculated by the equa-
tion:
S D
n
o
Vp 1VYSZ
scermet 5 s Ni 1 2 ]]] (2)
Viso,c
of the generalized effective media theory (GEM)
[29,35], in which s oNi is the conductivity of pure Ni
at 258C (137 600 S cm 21 [24]), Vp and VYSZ are the
volume fractions of pores and 8YSZ, respectively,
Viso,c is the critical volume fraction of isolating
phases, where the first percolation pathways are
 D. Simwonis et al. / Solid State Ionics 132 (2000) 241 – 251 249

formed by Ni, and n is an empirical exponent

(Viso,c 50.97 and n52.13 [34]). For the anode cermet
1
]5
r
O ]Vr 1 ]]]
i
ic
o
F
OrV
S
o
(7)
with Vp ¯0.4 and VYSZ ¯0.36 (VNi ¯0.24) a conduc- i i im
21 i
tivity of 5286 S cm is calculated, which is of the
o
order of the measured value (3900680 S cm 21 ). where r are the resistivities of the pure phases, Vic
i
With this theory, however, the change in con- is the continuous volume fraction of phase i, FS is
ductivity as a function of the exposure time of the the degree of separation [32,35] and Vim is the
cermet cannot be calculated since the volume frac- volume of phase i in a phase-mixed environment
tions in Eq. (2) remain constant and the change in without direct contact between grains of the same
Ni, 8YSZ and pore size cannot be considered. For phase. Because the electrical conductivity of 8YSZ
this reason a second theory, the concept of contiguity and pores can be regarded as zero at low tempera-
(CC) [32,35], was used, where these microstructural tures, eliminating all terms of Eq. (7) apart from that
changes are contained in a so-called ‘contiguity’ of Ni, and the continuous volumes can be replaced
term (Ci ). To the authors knowledge it is the only by Vic 5 Vi Ci [35], the conductivity of the anode
available theory, which contains a direct relationship cermet can be written as:
between measured intercept lengths and transport o
scermet 5 s NiVNi CNi (8)
property.
Ci is defined as the fraction of the contact areas Substituting Eq. (6) into Eq. (8) leads to:
(S Vi ) of phase i relative to the total inner surface [36]
2
and can be extended from the theoretical approach of o
V Ni l YSZ l p
a two-phase solid: scermet 5 s Ni ]]]]]]]]] (9)
VNi l YSZ l p 1VYSZ l Ni l p 1Vp l Ni l YSZ

Ci 5 S Vi /OS i
i
V (3)
Assuming that the electrical conductivity of 8YSZ
and pores equals zero, the only contact areas relevant
for electrical conduction are the Ni–Ni contacts.
Therefore Ci can be written explicitly for the cermet
with the three phases — Ni, YSZ and pores — as:
The electrical conductivity of the cermet calculated
according to Eq. (9) for the different exposure times
in Ar / 4% H 2 / 3% H 2 O at 10008C is shown in Fig. 9.
The measured conductivity of these cermets is shown
for comparison. For the calculations the measured
intercept lengths and the theoretically expected vol-
ume fractions of the phases were used. Although the

CNi 5 S Ni Ni YSZ
V /(S V 1 S V 1 S pV ) (4)

with i5Ni, YSZ and pores (p) considering the

simplifications outlined in Ref. [32]. Furthermore,
the volume / surface area ratio of phase i is related to
the intercept length l i by:
V l
]ii 5 ]i (5)
SV 4

Inserting Eq. (5) of each phase into Eq. (4) and

rearranging the terms gives:

VNi l YSZ l p
CNi 5 ]]]]]]]]] (6)
VNi l YSZ l p 1VYSZ l Ni l p 1Vp l Ni l YSZ
Fig. 9. Measured and calculated effective electrical conductivity
According to the concept of contiguity the resistivity at 258C as a function of the average intercept lengths of Ni
( r ) of a multi-phase material can be expressed as determined by image analysis prior to and after cermet exposure
[35]: in Ar / 4% H 2 / 3% H 2 O at 10008C.
250 D. Simwonis et al. / Solid State Ionics 132 (2000) 241 – 251
values obtained according to Eq. (9) are twice as
high as the measured conductivity, the evolution as a
function of exposure time is fairly well described by
the contiguity concept. The values for CNi decrease
due to changing particle sizes, thus interrupting the
Ni continuity, i.e. the number of conduction path-
ways in the cermet is reduced. From the calculations
it is deduced that 23% of the Ni fraction, i.e. 5.6% of
the total volume, contributes to the electronic con-
ductivity. These values are reduced after 4000 h at
10008C to 20 and 4.8%, respectively.
It is therefore worth mentioning that the per-
centage loss of conductivity is higher than the
increase of particle size (Table 2), which can be
regarded as an indication that the composition of the
anode cermet is close to the percolation threshold
[37]. Exceeding this threshold would decrease the
conductivity by several orders of magnitude and
therefore the calculated values can be regarded as a
fairly good approximation to the measured data.
Finally it should be noted that the calculations are
very sensitive to slight changes in particle sizes.
Considering a deviation of 0.2 mm, which is much
smaller than the standard deviation for the measured
values (Table 2), the calculated values in Fig. 9
would drop by 1500–2000 S cm 21 . For an exact
theoretical approach it would be desirable for future
experiments to introduce functions of the particle
size distributions instead of mean intercept lengths
into the CC equations.
5. Conclusions
A series of microstructure investigations were
carried out on anode substrates with a view to aging
phenomena. An evaluation routine for quantitative
image analysis was specifically developed for these
investigations together with an appropriate cross-
section preparation technique enabling all phases of
the cermet and their changes to be quantitatively
determined. Anode cermets were exposed at 10008C
in Ar / 4% H 2 / 3% H 2 O for up to 4000 h and showed
a decrease in electrical conductivity of up to 33.3%
of the original value. The microstructural analysis
showed that the Ni-particle size distribution shifted
towards larger Ni particles with increasing exposure
time (the average Ni diameter increases from 2 to 2.6
mm after 4000 h of exposure).
The YSZ and pore size distributions did not show
any pronounced change with exposure time. The
pore network is coarser in comparison to the YSZ
network.
The dependence of the electrical conductivity on
the microstructure of the anode cermet was investi-
gated using the GEM and the CC theories, which
consider the transport properties as a function of the
microstructure. The GEM theory did not permit a
calculation of the change in conductivity as a
function of cermet exposure time. The CC theory
described the evolution of electrical conductivity
fairly well as a function of exposure time but
provided values about twice as high as the measured
conductivity.
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