Fuel cells produce clean and green power in an environmentally
friendly way. An energy device fuel cell is used because of its higher
efficiency and fuel flexibility. A number of efforts have been made
to commercialize this technology by reducing its cost and operating
temperature, and enhancing the durability. The operating temperature
and performance of the cell depend on the electrolyte’s stability
and durability. Therefore, Ga–doped ceria electrolyte was synthesized
by the coprecipitation technique. X–ray powder diffraction
(XRD) spectra confirm the successful doping of gallium into ceria
and reveal a cubic structure with crystallite size ranging from 50
to 60 nm. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) analysis confirmed the
homogeneous surface morphology of the prepared material. The optical
band gap shows a red shift compared to ceria. Thermal analysis shows
that sample “d” has the lowest weight loss of 0.33%
in the range 20–900 °C. It has been observed that the
composition Ga0.04Ce0.96O2−δ exhibited a maximum conductivity of 0.054 S cm–1 at 600 °C. The cell showed a power density of 86 mW cm–2 at 600 °C with an OCV of 1.02 V. Density functional
theory depicts that gallium doping reduces the band gap and shifts
the O 2p states toward Fermi level, due to which conductivity of the
doped system is improved. The results reveal that Ga–doped
ceria is an efficient electrolyte for fuel cells.