Current electric vehicles are driven be batteries that contain lithium, an element that is difficult to extract and pretty expensive. So what are the pros and cons of the new sodium-ion batteries China has developped?
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00:00Chinese electric cars are making headlines again because some of them are running on batteries made of salt.
00:07Well, that's what's being reported at least.
00:10Until now, lithium has been the key ingredient in e-car batteries, but it's difficult and expensive to obtain.
00:18But salt, a.k.a. sodium, isn't.
00:21I really can see these headlines in front of me.
00:24Are sodium ion batteries the lithium killer?
00:28Does China's head start mean they'll rule the market again?
00:31Or do companies in Europe stand a chance of competing?
00:34Welcome to this episode of Transforming Business.
00:43Lithium is an ultralight element that's become an integral part of battery technology.
00:48But it's relatively difficult and expensive to procure.
00:51Extraction methods vary depending on where it comes from.
00:55The three biggest producers are Australia, Chile and China.
00:59Until now, China is by far the largest battery producer.
01:03We're going to need more battery capacity in the next few decades, not just for our smartphones, laptops and electric cars, but to store wind and solar energy.
01:13The market will probably not only double until 2030.
01:18It's probably times five more like this.
01:22Martin Oschatz is a professor for the chemistry of energy materials at the University of Jena, Germany.
01:28Relying on lithium alone won't cut it.
01:31The world will need every option available, and that's where sodium ion batteries come into the picture.
01:37So let's take a look at that element.
01:39Beneath the Earth's crust, sodium is abundant, making up around 2.3 percent.
01:45It might not sound like much, but that's over 1,000 times more the amount of lithium found under the Earth's crust.
01:53Not only is it more readily available, but it's also cheaper.
01:58In early 2024, sodium carbonate was valued at approximately $290 per metric ton.
02:06Battery grade lithium carbonate was more than $13,000 per metric ton.
02:13And lithium batteries need precious materials like cobalt and nickel to work.
02:18But sodium doesn't. It's found everywhere.
02:21It's simply salt and not limited to a specific region.
02:29The world's largest battery manufacturer, Chinese CATL, already went big on sodium ion technology in 2021.
02:39Just two years later, it was supplying Chinese carmaker Sherry with salt batteries.
02:45And recently, this e-car type from JAC Group's Yiwei was in the spotlight.
02:52Reports say that some of the cars from this model are powered by a sodium battery.
02:58This probably means that in some Chinese cities, tiny salt-powered e-cars are already in use,
03:04though we weren't able to find any further information or figures on how many of them.
03:13At the moment, I think China is leading the race. One should never give up.
03:17But we have this technology sooner or later with us also, I think.
03:21But now it's in China and we have to close the gap.
03:24But what does that mean for the big lithium producers?
03:27Chile, Bolivia and Argentina, they constitute what's known as a lithium triangle
03:32because together they own about 53 percent of lithium reserves worldwide.
03:37Does the invention of sodium batteries threaten their turf?
03:41We tend to compare lithium ion and sodium ion technology as competitors.
03:47And I really can see these headlines in front of me.
03:51Are sodium ion batteries the lithium killer?
03:54This is Alexander Buchel. He's a battery cell development manager at Ultras.
03:59He and William work for a Swedish sodium ion battery startup,
04:04located about an hour's drive from Stockholm in a city called Uppsala.
04:09He tells us that his entry into the sodium ion battery sector started by accident during his postdoc.
04:17We were producing so much blue powder that there was blue all over the walls and all over the fume hoods
04:22and the university was getting upset at us.
04:25Here's how sodium ion batteries are made.
04:28First, this bright blue powder is made into a slurry and then coated onto aluminum foil.
04:35It's dried in a big machine like this one and then compressed on a machine like this.
04:41The excess is trimmed away with a laser cutter.
04:44All these black squares are stacked together before going into a hermetically sealed glove box here
04:52and where electrolytes are added under a controlled environment.
04:57Then it's just a matter of testing the battery.
05:00One of the arguments for sodium ion batteries is that they can cycle more,
05:05which means they can be used and recharged and used again more than lithium ion batteries.
05:11Talking about lifetime here, we have to of course also talk about in what applications are they being used.
05:17For example, portable electronics.
05:20A person is very happy if you can charge and discharge your mobile phone for more than a thousand times
05:26without losing a lot of capacity.
05:28And what about cars?
05:29Remember the headline that Chinese e-cars are powered by sodium ion batteries?
05:33Can't the technology be scaled up?
05:36With lithium ion batteries, we have a great product market fit for especially electric vehicles.
05:42And this is also where we see that sodium ion batteries will have a hard time,
05:47mainly because there is an inherently lower energy density to the technology.
05:52This is Andreas Haas from the Swedish firm Northvolt,
05:56a big lithium ion battery producer in Europe.
05:59It works with Altris in sodium ion battery development and production
06:03and wants to reach full-scale production by the end of the decade.
06:07The hardest part about creating a new battery technology
06:10is actually not making one good battery in a laboratory.
06:13It's to produce a million of those, including the supply chain of it,
06:17including the gigafactors that you need to build.
06:19But why is China so far ahead?
06:22Experts say that while Europe has been researching sodium ion batteries for longer,
06:26China actually commercialized them earlier and got a head start of at least three or four years.
06:32One of the main hurdles they face is weight.
06:35They tend to be heavier than lithium ion batteries.
06:39The physical dimensions will be a little bit larger.
06:43And so these are the main drawbacks of sodium versus lithium.
06:48It's the weight, it's the volume.
06:50The energy density is therefore a little bit lower compared to lithium.
06:55William estimates that they're about half as powerful as their lithium counterparts
06:59in terms of generating power.
07:01This isn't a problem for small cars like those now used in China.
07:04But for bigger EVs meant to drive longer distances,
07:07larger and heavier batteries are needed.
07:11With the sodium ion batteries, we think that first in the energy storage system market,
07:16where we have 20-foot containers that are basically just being placed next to renewable energy assets and substations.
07:23We're talking about stationary energy storage, battery-driven industrial equipment,
07:29such as warehouse machinery, forklifts, and so on.
07:33And while the production of sodium ion batteries is slowly getting underway,
07:37the market for lithium ion batteries is booming.
07:41One estimate puts the market value of sodium ion batteries at $920 million by 2030.
07:49By comparison, lithium ion batteries' market value is expected to grow to over $270 billion.
07:57We will probably, at least in the next 20 years, not have the situation that so many sodium ion batteries are made
08:03that lithium ion battery production is decreasing.
08:06Maybe they are closing the gap, but the decline in lithium ion battery production at the moment is not on the horizon, in my opinion.
08:13The two technologies are similar in many ways, something battery makers have realized.
08:19Many lithium battery producers have started investing in sodium.
08:25I believe that rather than viewing lithium ion and sodium ion as competitors,
08:31it would be more accurate to see them as a part of a larger landscape in energy storage solutions.
08:39So what does China's head start mean for other companies trying to enter the market?
08:43Can they compete?
08:45The fact is that China is a forerunner in the production of electric vehicles and car batteries.
08:50And it's already begun commercializing sodium ion batteries.
08:55Sodium is cheaper and available in larger quantities than lithium.
08:59But sodium ion batteries are bigger and heavier.
09:02European companies are working on a viable product.
09:06But experts say that China is at least three to four years ahead.
09:11We will probably know in a few decades how successful they were.
09:14And whether sodium ion batteries will dominate the market or be used alongside lithium ones.
09:20What do you think? Let us know in the comments.
09:29For more UN videos visit www.un.org