Firms are exploring sodium batteries as an alternative to lithium
Firms are exploring sodium batteries as an alternative to lithium
Unlike lithium, sodium is cheap and abundant
Na-Ion can be a lot less expensive. But it's a lot heavier. (Not a problem for grid-storage.)
As a flashlight enthusiast, I'd be very interested to see if sodium batteries are any better.
Was just reading through the articles I could find about it and it seems you can't make cylindrical batteries with it. Which sucks for existing flashlights. I'm sure if the tech ever picks up some other shape of flashlight could be made.
They also seem to have less capacity overall.
There are cylindrical cells available. The capacity is pretty low, 18650 cells are around 1.5AH and 26700 cells are around 3.5AH. They discharge down to 1.5V, so you will get less capacity if you use them in something designed for lithium cells.
Can we eat them?
At least once, yes
Battery-licking good!
BYD is supposedly bringing them to production.
https://cleantechnica.com/2023/04/22/the-sodium-ion-battery-is-coming-to-production-cars-this-year/
They are already in production, and sold to consumer, since few days. A french start up is selling an electric screwdriver with a sodium battery.
So the answer to the question about what to do with the excess salt from desalination plants, is make batteries?
Good point !
Now we just need a lot of swimming pools for the chloride.
Have they eliminated the need for sodium to be molten in sodium batteries? If so, that's great news!
IIRC sodium is the -cathode- in the battery. No molten (RU thinking of reactors?)
I'm not thinking of reactors, though I am aware that molten sodium is used as a coolant fluid. It seems that I was remembering an off-hand comment in a MinutePhysics video from a few years ago. Molten sodium batteries do exist, but regular sodium batteries also exist.
Sodium = Natrium
IDK why English speakers insist on calling it Sodium on an international forum?Most likely because the news is in English. And why would Natrium be better on an international forum?
It is Sodium in most Latin languages (despite Natrium being Latin), in Hindi and in Arabic. And Chinese has a different root. Among the 10 most spoken languages (according to Wikipedia), only Russian is using Natrium.
Sodium is imprecise, as it can mean simply salt (NaCl), or it can mean Natrium (Na).
AFAIK there's a reason the symbol is Na. And that's because the internationally accepted scientific name is Natrium.It's not only Russian that uses Natrium, Scandinavia and German language do too.
Apparently the term Sodium is from Arab. I admit I thought it was like Pineapple, which only exist in English, sounding like a fruit from cold northern pine-apple trees. 😋
I’ve never heard natrium before. I guess I could learn. We could also call pineapples ananas.