Baptiste Morin 07:15, December 01, 2022
It is less expensive but still efficient: the sodium battery should arrive on the market next year, while the world has been waiting for it for decades to come.
It was the Chinese battery giant CATL which announced that its production line was already ready for this type of innovation.
More affordable electric cars are no longer a dream but soon a reality.
An innovation that was expected for decades to come was presented by the Chinese giant CATL: no longer lithium but sodium batteries.
The world's leading battery manufacturer definitely has a head start: the production line is already ready and discussions with manufacturers have begun.
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A less rare and therefore less expensive metal
The sodium battery has several advantages.
It is less flammable than the lithium battery and above all, there is at least 500 times more sodium than lithium in the earth's crust, which would explain why the price of the electric vehicle would be lower with this type of innovation.
"It's interesting because it potentially makes it possible to have cheaper batteries since the base metal is cheaper," explains physicist and researcher Greg De Temmerman.
As for the performance of the battery, they will be "a little lower than what we have with lithium" but they will remain "fairly acceptable", concludes the physicist.
Not to mention that these performances should still evolve today.
The energy density of a sodium battery is 40% lower than that of a lithium battery.
Sodium therefore remains less efficient than lithium, but the process is promising.
Today's sodium batteries are of higher quality than the lithium batteries of seven years ago.