ABSTRACT
Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFCs) are promising energy conversion devices for electricity generation because of their high efficiency and environmental friendliness. Recently, a leading advanced gas turbine manufacturer announced the development of a triple combined cycle power plant with a power generation efficiency over 70% (Choi et al. 2014). In this concept, the exhaust flue gas of the turbine was fed into the heat exchanger for increasing the temperature of compressed air, which promotes the kinetics of the SOFC electrochemical reactions (Jia et al. 2013). Therefore, the ideal operating temperature for the energy integration of SOFCs in next-generation triple combined cycle systems in the near future should be close to the exhaust temperature, which is currently ≤ 650 °C for the most advanced large-scale J-and H-class gas turbines.
