They don't mention it in this article but the big positive going for Sodium batteries is the cost, they are half the price of li-ion per KWH and about a third the price of Li-Pho. There are already quite cheap Sodium battery based cars out from BYD and while they are the lower range end of things (200 miles) they are also considerably cheaper.
So I think Sodium will find its way into the lower range EVs and home/grid storage since its so much cheaper. But I don't imagine we will want less power in phones or laptops as sodium is bigger and heavier.
I would love a lower end rickshaw/golfcart tier small ev. It would be great for trips and errands around town you could do on lower speed roads. I don’t need a 5000lb behemoth.
My problem is, if EV is not going to work for 100% of my use cases, I need a second car. But if I need a second car then it doesn't make sense to overthink the EV, any will do. What would be really awesome is if I could have one car and swap the power train easily, but that's just fantasy talk.
There's the Arcimoto FUV. I'd consider it a step up from golfcart/rickshaw as it's meant to go at highway speeds, but it's much smaller/lighter than a regular car.
Lithium is only a small fraction of the mass of Li-ion batteries. Also, Li does not change oxidation state in Li-ion batteries, so its energy of ionization doesn't affect the voltage of the cell.
Why do you say they don't mention the cost? I'm sorry but like that's what the ENTIRE article is about, the cost savings of sodium batteries over lithium.
"Since the chemical components are cheap, a scaled-up industry should be able to produce batteries that cost less than their lithium counterparts."
They do not mention its a half to a third the price of the two prevailing technologies and they they have weaselled it with "should". It does cost less already, you have been able to buy sodium ion batteries on aliexpress for months and the cars are already out from BYD and many more are scheduled later this year and into next.
The article is mostly about the geopolitics of the materials.
So I stand by they don't mention it, I read that article and I felt this was the key missing context as to why Sodium batteries are going to matter.
For me, the biggest benefit is the dramatically improved environmental profile. You drop a lithium battery in a body of water and besides the potential for some interesting pyrotechnics, you also have a moderately bad environmental pollution situation. I expect the situation to be much better with a sodium based battery.
This is the short version of The Economist's piece on sodium batteries. For headline stories there is often a short and a long version. The long version is linked in the article or you can find it here:
Yeah the ignorance here is pretty strong. Unless all these people have inside knowledge that CATL's claimed density and specs are BS.
CATL's Sodium Ion is 160 wh/kg. That's basically LFP, and LFP means a 200-300 mile car, and supposed to scale to $40/kwhr (cell level) which implies a drivetrain cost at initial purchase that is almost physically impossible for ICE to match.
Roadmap is 200 wh/kg, and while roadmaps are often a bit optimistic from chinese manufacturers timewise, they do seem to hit the densities.
The other big news is CATL is doing 200+ wh/kg LFP, and of course has roadmaps for 230+.
We shall see, but if CATL and others meet the cost and density estimates with acceptable cycle endurance and safety, it is a clear path to probably 3-4 billion EVs.
And if Sodium-Sulfur and Lithium-Sulfur succeed ... that should be 2x to 3x the power density
> Perhaps the biggest disadvantage of sodium batteries is their late start.
Sodium batteries have a long history. I know the US Navy was using them for batteries on their submarines back in the 70s, and they surely started long before then. Lead-acid batteries emit H2 which would be a disaster in a sub.
On problem I remember about them was that they run very hot, and are liable to catch fire. Perhaps that has been solved in the last five decades!
Apparently the non-rechargeable version is the primary power source of AAM, SAM, and cruise missiles. The interesting thing is before use the salt is solid and inert (without degradation in a long-term stockpile) but once triggered with a pyrotechnic primer they reach an operating temperature of 400-550 for the single use lifetime.
Sodium batteries looks great on the outside, but amount of charge discharge cycles is roughly half what lithium batteries can do. So what you will save on cost difference between sodium and lithium will get eaten up by shorter life of sodium battery.
Understand that, they're about half the cost of lithium currently, but they don't have nearly the same scale benefit as lithium does. It's likely that cost could half again if they achieved the same scale.
And recall that, early lithium batteries had a fraction of the longevity that current designs have, so, it's likely that sodium batteries have plenty of room for improvement in that regard as well.
In my mind, the likely application is grid-scale storage where density doesn't matter as much but upfront cost does. Not really so much for renewables, but more so that you can store your unused base load during offpeak hours for later use.
That's true, which makes them perfect for Powerwall-type backup power, where weight is not a concern and the number of cycles will be very low.
The other way to deal with low cycle count is to keep the cells only half-charged and minimize the excursions from that. A large pack that goes from 40 to 60 percent daily will last eons compared to one cycled from 90 to 10 percent.
From what I understand, the degradation of the cell is not linear with the discharge excursion. So you may have exponentially better battery life the narrower of charge band you keep it in. If anyone has more detailed information let me know, I'd like to see better numbers.
That’s fine though. Thanks to time value of money, if it costs half as much but has to be replaced in half the time it’s actually quite profitable. (Assuming, of course, the labor cost is low.)
If they can be recycled like lithium, even better.
Something that will complicate technological solutions going forward is the need to have no negative environmental impacts across the entire lifecycle of any new contraptions, under a scenario where they are produced, used and recycled at planetary scale and for... a long time.
These types of constraints did not exist in the earlier technological innovation eras but are sort-of self-evident now: There is not much point to do embark on expensive retooling of the entire energy system if it simply results in a sort of "footprint-shift", reduce GHG emissions but increase environmental impacts elsewhere.
The article (and links therein) don't provide an immediate view on these aspects of different approaches to battery construction. Maybe it is too early in the cycle. But I think these issues will have to be explored thoroughly for any solution that is deemed technically and economically viable.
It'll be interesting to see whether there might be any kind of late-mover advantage for those who sat out lithium and begin pursuing sodium-based batteries now.
Sodium battery production mosdef benefits from lithium's advances.
As you know, each new chemistry (and anode, cathode, etc) opens up new niches, use cases, and price points. Sodium won't displace so much as compliment lithium.
Readit News
So I think Sodium will find its way into the lower range EVs and home/grid storage since its so much cheaper. But I don't imagine we will want less power in phones or laptops as sodium is bigger and heavier.
https://www.squadmobility.com/
https://electrek.co/2022/12/06/squad-solar-electric-city-car...
https://www.citroen.co.uk/ami
"Since the chemical components are cheap, a scaled-up industry should be able to produce batteries that cost less than their lithium counterparts."
They do not mention its a half to a third the price of the two prevailing technologies and they they have weaselled it with "should". It does cost less already, you have been able to buy sodium ion batteries on aliexpress for months and the cars are already out from BYD and many more are scheduled later this year and into next.
The article is mostly about the geopolitics of the materials.
So I stand by they don't mention it, I read that article and I felt this was the key missing context as to why Sodium batteries are going to matter.
https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2023/10/25/...
https://archive.ph/Tw4Gj
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33750955
CATL's Sodium Ion is 160 wh/kg. That's basically LFP, and LFP means a 200-300 mile car, and supposed to scale to $40/kwhr (cell level) which implies a drivetrain cost at initial purchase that is almost physically impossible for ICE to match.
Roadmap is 200 wh/kg, and while roadmaps are often a bit optimistic from chinese manufacturers timewise, they do seem to hit the densities.
The other big news is CATL is doing 200+ wh/kg LFP, and of course has roadmaps for 230+.
We shall see, but if CATL and others meet the cost and density estimates with acceptable cycle endurance and safety, it is a clear path to probably 3-4 billion EVs.
And if Sodium-Sulfur and Lithium-Sulfur succeed ... that should be 2x to 3x the power density
Sodium batteries have a long history. I know the US Navy was using them for batteries on their submarines back in the 70s, and they surely started long before then. Lead-acid batteries emit H2 which would be a disaster in a sub.
On problem I remember about them was that they run very hot, and are liable to catch fire. Perhaps that has been solved in the last five decades!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium%E2%80%93sulfur_battery
And recall that, early lithium batteries had a fraction of the longevity that current designs have, so, it's likely that sodium batteries have plenty of room for improvement in that regard as well.
In my mind, the likely application is grid-scale storage where density doesn't matter as much but upfront cost does. Not really so much for renewables, but more so that you can store your unused base load during offpeak hours for later use.
The other way to deal with low cycle count is to keep the cells only half-charged and minimize the excursions from that. A large pack that goes from 40 to 60 percent daily will last eons compared to one cycled from 90 to 10 percent.
From what I understand, the degradation of the cell is not linear with the discharge excursion. So you may have exponentially better battery life the narrower of charge band you keep it in. If anyone has more detailed information let me know, I'd like to see better numbers.
How much cheaper are these types of batteries expected to be?
This is not true if you are talking about lithium ion batteries. It may be true for some chemistries if you are talking about lithium iron phosphate.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-ion_battery#Comparison
If they can be recycled like lithium, even better.
Please remember there are a lot of different sodium-ion chemistries.
These types of constraints did not exist in the earlier technological innovation eras but are sort-of self-evident now: There is not much point to do embark on expensive retooling of the entire energy system if it simply results in a sort of "footprint-shift", reduce GHG emissions but increase environmental impacts elsewhere.
The article (and links therein) don't provide an immediate view on these aspects of different approaches to battery construction. Maybe it is too early in the cycle. But I think these issues will have to be explored thoroughly for any solution that is deemed technically and economically viable.
Sodium is good for stationary deployments. It's not good when weight matters.
As you know, each new chemistry (and anode, cathode, etc) opens up new niches, use cases, and price points. Sodium won't displace so much as compliment lithium.