More durable, cheaper, can be operated at a wider temperature range and much safer, but at a cost of lower energy density.
They look like a big step forward for uses where density matters little, like grid energy storage or small scale home backups.
Comment on The Sodium-Ion Battery Revolution Has Started
just_another_person@lemmy.world 2 days ago
No, it actually hasn’t. It’s also not any better than any other battery tech out there right now. Longer term but less volume storage is a trade off.
What happened to these Graphene batteries and capacitors we were supposed to have by now?
tty5@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Creat@discuss.tchncs.de 2 days ago
The thing currently costs at least 50% more than the closest equivalent LiFePo4 from the same brand. The only real advantage seems to be it’s ability to handle sub freezing temperatures, but usability still drops dramatically (both capacity and available power delivery). Everything else is straight up worse in this one in direct comparison.
It’s only the first product, so it’ll most certainly get better. Also as numbers of products sold rise, costs fall. Once these are cheaper, that are a real choice.
tty5@lemmy.world 2 days ago
CATL wholesale pricing per kWh is already almost 50% below lifepo with a goal of sub $20/kWh pricing in coming years.
Creat@discuss.tchncs.de 1 day ago
Sorry but the theoretical price of cells isn’t relevant to the consumer. The price of products containing them is. This thing costs currently on the official site 900€ (with some sort of sale going on). The Elite 100v2 with comparable capacity, but using LiFePo4 (included in the same current sale) costs just 550€. To add insult to injury, it also outperforms the Na model in nearly every aspect except sub-freezing performance. This includes an abysmal solar charging efficiency of roughly 50% at normal temperature. Somehow.
Again, once the price reflects the cell cost, this could be a very attractive option. At the moment, unless you’re into camping in sun-zero climates, it’s just a very bad deal.
IronBird@lemmy.world 2 days ago
sodium-ion is better than acid-lead in every use case (theoretically, when the tech reaches maturity), unlikely to beat lithium ion and others for the high-capacity/low weight type stuff but far as cheap/environmentally safe batteries goes sodium-ion should quickly dominate the field.
Valmond@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Yeah, this kind of tech can actually be groundbreaking.
10.000 charge cycles? You can imagine lot’s of new things with that. Maybe not a capitalistic quick buck but something bettering society.
Also for what I have understood it’s wildly better than lipo etc when it comes to resource use, especially “rare” earth.
ikidd@lemmy.world 1 day ago
10k charge cycles isn’t revolutionary. LFP do 8k and even then they just drop down to 80% of original capacity.
Valmond@lemmy.world 1 day ago
For that price and energy density it IMO is
You could load up your car at work (just a silly example) and use it up at night at home, without thinking of degrading your expensive batteries.
Eheran@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Here is hoping.