Can we make them from desalination plants, in part? Or no? I don’t know the science for it.
Comment on Peak Energy just shipped the US's first grid-scale sodium-ion battery
partial_accumen@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
This is big! Grid scale Sodium Ion battery technology is (on paper) the best candidate for cheap large scale electricity storage. The fact that this company is working on 9 pilot deployments mean that this will likely produce the real world results that the paper exercises promise.
There are SO MANY advantages of Sodium Ion battery tech for grid storage over everything else we’ve used so far (nearly all Lithium based).
Sodium Ion batteries:
- don’t have as intense thermal management needs Lithium chemistries
- don’t have the massive negative environmental impact for their source materials (because its a part of regular old table/sea salt)
- doesn’t have the massive swings in capacity when operated in extreme hot or cold temperatures. Sodium Ion doesn’t care.
The only downsides to Sodium Ion is that the batteries are physically larger for the same amount of energy stored (which isn’t a problem for stationary storage), and the charging/discharging curves are not as linear as other chemistries (which again, isn’t an issue because these are purpose built applications where the curves can easily be managed by battery management systems).
Fredthefishlord@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
Gsus4@mander.xyz 3 weeks ago
Yeah, the brine is where various useful ions are extracted from.
Truscape@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
It’s both amazing and hilarious that our battery production is similar to modded Minecraft logic.
SkyeStarfall@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
Well, not too surprising, modded Minecraft chemistry is modeled after real life after all!
Gsus4@mander.xyz 3 weeks ago
I love this too, I just hope they don’t use too much Phosphorous, because those reserves are limited too, maybe there are alternative designs once this gets going.
dubyakay@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
What about the environmental impact of degraded sodium ion batteries?
I’m not going to take sodium mining into account, as there are many ways that it can be extracted, with probably minimal impact, like salt evaporation ponds. I assume it’s less destructive than building a hydro dam.
empireOfLove2@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
I’m really excited about na-ion, if commercial BMS circuitry was available I would already have some for a few home automation and sensing projects because of their low temp performance alone. But I’ll have to spin up a custom implementation with an arduino or something and I don’t have that kind of skills lol.
Zwuzelmaus@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
everything else we’ve used so far (nearly all Lithium based).
We have used water before lithium, and it isn’t bad at all.
partial_accumen@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
We have used water before lithium, and it isn’t bad at all.
Not so great in a flat dry desert though. Pump storage is great when there is lots of water and a naturally occurring elevation, but there’s lots of places on Earth that don’t have that, but do have energy to store.
Zwuzelmaus@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
in a flat dry desert
Hopefully you are free not to live there…
Madagaskar_sky@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Middle east would like a word with you.
Gsus4@mander.xyz 3 weeks ago
Pumped hydro?
redhat421@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Also very good, but geographically limited.
4am@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
Would container ships be a good application? Or too heavy/large?
yaroto98@lemmy.org 3 weeks ago
I would happily dedicate a corner of my garage for a big sodium ion battery.
Also, fun fact they can charge and discharge faster than lithium ion. Also, their chemistry doesn’t lead to spontaneous combustion. Perfect for a house backup.