Why a sodium-ion battery could be the finest electric car battery in the future
There's no shortage of interest in electric vehicle battery startups or multibillion-dollar investments in the industry, as corporations, investors, and scientists search for the winning strategy. China, on the other hand, has already moved on to the next leg of the race — one that does not rely on a large, bold innovation — with sodium-ion batteries. If achieved efficaciously, this generation has the potential to lead to significant adoption in a market this is heavily reliant on subsidies and wherein EV sales stay a small percent of total automobile sales.
Sodium-ion batteries aren't a brand new invention. They have been studied inside the Nineteen Seventies, however, they had been rapidly handed by way of a newer, fancier, and more promising model — the lithium-ion battery. Because of their giant use, sodium-based totally ones did not locate many takers, and any ongoing development took a returned seat.
Now, decades later, the problems with lithium-ion batteries are becoming clear. Cost reduction is a constant challenge for automakers and battery producers. While lithium-ion batteries are one of the most important breakthroughs in power storage history, they are rapidly being plagued by difficulties such as material cost and availability, as well as safety. There is a perpetual tug of war between stable chemistry and unstable chemistry. such that the battery does not explode, and higher energy density
The sodium-ion battery claims to be cleaner, safer, and cheaper than lithium-ion batteries found in practically every EV today, as well as charging faster and functioning better in adverse weather. Will the reality live up to the hype that is created?
Why it is significant: Lithium-ion batteries have a high energy density, which means they can store a large amount of charge in comparison to their weight. As a result, they are well-suited for powering EVs, as larger batteries will lower the car's range.
However, mining lithium is costly, environmentally damaging, and necessitates a large amount of water - around 500,000 gallons per tonne of lithium.
This is especially troublesome because more than half of the world's lithium supply is located in one of the world's driest regions, forcing farmers to struggle for restricted water supplies with lithium miners.
Lithium is also a rather scarce element, and growing demand is already driving up the element's price. Higher battery costs mean higher EV costs, thus we'll need to look at alternative types of batteries if we want more people to switch from fossil-fuel vehicles to EVs.
A salty solution: Battery manufacturers consider sodium-ion technology as a viable alternative to lithium batteries.
Sodium is 1,000 times more abundant, cheaper, and easier to extract than lithium. Because sodium-ion batteries can operate in a wider temperature range, they may be more cost-effective.
What's new: China's Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. (CATL) is the world's largest EV battery manufacturer, supplying batteries to Tesla, Volkswagen, and other automakers — and after years of research and development, it's now adding a sodium-ion battery to its product line.
According to CATL, this sodium-ion battery charges quickly, reaching 80 percent capacity in just 15 minutes (exactly how far that would get a driver would depend on the EV). It also works well in temperatures below zero degrees Fahrenheit.
The hitch is that CATL's new battery suffers from the equal predicament that has lengthy plagued sodium-ion generation: it cannot shape the energy density of a lithium-ion battery.
In other words, the battery must be heavier, which means the automobile expends more energy transporting its own battery around, lowering fuel efficiency.
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