One of society's most significant challenges in engineering is the generation of energy from clean, efficient, reliable, and environmentally friendly sources . Fuel cells are one of the most efficient and effective solutions to meet this challenge . These electrochemical devices convert the chemical energy of fuel gas into electrical work without the need for combustion. Moreover, fuel cells can also be used for grid-scale renewable energy storage through high-efficiency conversion of chemical energy with zero 𝐶𝑂 ! emissions while offering a wide variety of potential applications for electricity generation in residential, vehicular, and industrial settings . Among all types of fuel cells, solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) offer numerous advantages such as high energy density, high efficiency (beyond 60% and up to ~90 % with the addition of heat recovery cycles), no cyclical variations of voltage (voltage disturbances) or electrical fluctuation, and no environmental noise as compared to conventional power generation systems . In the SOFCs, the electronic current is generated by oxidation of the fuel gas at the anode and oxygen reduction at the cathode. Therefore, the electrical current is made possible by the flow of the ions, down the chemical potential gradient of the mobile species, from the anode to the cathode through an ionic conductor membrane and electrons transport in an external circuit. The general mechanism of the current flow is explained via mass transport of oxide-ions through the solid ion-conductor electrolyte by introducing vacancies into the crystal structure and random hopping mechanism of the charged species to the vacancies . Thus, ionic conductivity is increased significantly at elevated temperatures where sufficient energy allows ions to hop into and out of charged vacancies . However, cell operation at high temperatures introduces thermal stresses, corrosion, increased system cost, and stack durability challenges. Therefore, there has been increased interest in reducing SOFCs operating temperatures from the high-temperature (HT-SOFCs) regime (800 °𝐶 to 1000 °𝐶) down to the so-called intermediate-temperature (IT-SOFCs) regime (500 °𝐶 to 700 °𝐶). It has been proposed that using materials operating at intermediate temperatures could expand applications of fuel cells to large-scale stationary applications and smaller scale portable power/transportation markets . While Yttria-Stabilized Zirconia (YSZ) has been the most investigated membrane material for SOFCs as well as SOECs, Scandia-Stabilized Zirconia (SSZ) has shown almost 3-4 times higher ionic conductivity compared to that of YSZ . Moreover, YSZ exhibits a conductivity degradation by an imbalanced electrochemical potential gradient of oxygen ions through the electrolyte . The higher ionic conductivity in scandia-stabilized zirconia(SSZ) is attributed to the minimal ionic radii mismatch between 𝑆𝑐 "% and 𝑍𝑟 &% . Fujimori and Badwal comprehensively investigated the 𝑆𝑐 ! 𝑂 " -𝑍𝑟𝑂 ! system and discovered monoclinic (m), tetragonal (t), cubic (c), metastable tetragonal (𝑡 ' , 𝑡′′), and rhombohedral (𝛽) phases exist from a range of 0 < 𝑆𝑐 ! 𝑂 " 𝑚𝑜𝑙% ≤ 25.