Recently, the upstream materials of lithium batteries have once again opened the price increase mode, and the average price of lithium carbonate has risen from 300,000 yuan / ton to 500,000 yuan / ton, and the market is in short supply. In this context, the advantages of sodium-ion batteries with similar performance to lithium-ion batteries are highlighted.
(Wen 丨 This newspaper reporter Lu Qixiu)
The mass production process is accelerated
"At present, the price of lithium carbonate has hit a new high in recent years, and companies with strategic vision have been looking for alternative technical routes, and sodium-ion batteries are the first choice." Hu Yongsheng, founder of Zhongke Haina, introduced to reporters that sodium-ion batteries are rich in raw material resources, widely distributed, low in cost, and the physical and chemical properties and storage mechanisms of sodium and lithium are similar, and the existing lithium-ion battery materials and cell production processes and production equipment can be used, so that the rapid application of sodium batteries is feasible.
In fact, sodium-ion batteries are not new, as early as the 1970s, they have appeared in the laboratory, but a variety of reasons have led to a stagnation in related research. At present, the gap in raw materials upstream of lithium batteries is expanding, forcing a number of enterprises to invest in the construction and research and development of sodium-ion batteries.
In July 2021, CATL released the company's first generation of sodium-ion batteries, which made the industry's attention to sodium-ion battery technology heat up rapidly. According to the Ningde era, the energy density of its sodium-ion battery cell monomer is 160 watt-hours / kg, and it can be filled with 80% of the electricity in 15 minutes at room temperature, and the low temperature environment of minus 20 degrees Celsius can achieve more than 90% discharge retention rate. Subsequently, Sunwoda also publicly stated that the company has a number of patents such as sodium-ion battery sodium supplementation method, sodium-ion battery and its preparation method. At the end of 2021, China Three Gorges Group reached a cooperation with Zhongke Haina and Fuyang Municipal People's Government to jointly build the world's first large-scale mass production line of sodium-ion batteries, with a production capacity planned at 5 GWh, and the first phase of the project is scheduled to be put into operation this year.
Improve the industrial chain
Has sodium-ion battery technology matured? It is understood that sodium-ion batteries are composed of positive electrodes, negative electrodes, electrolytes and diaphragms like lithium batteries. Compared with lithium ions, sodium ions are larger in volume and have more stringent requirements in terms of material structural stability and kinetic properties, which is also the reason why sodium-ion batteries are difficult to commercialize.
In the view of Xu Bin, a professor at Beijing University of Chemical Technology, mastering high-safety, long-life, low-cost electrode materials is the key to the commercial use of sodium-ion batteries.
"Since 2010, sodium-ion battery research has heated up rapidly, and the number of patent applications has increased year by year. At present, more than 20 companies around the world are committed to the research and development of sodium-ion batteries. Hu Yongsheng pointed out that the research and development of sodium-ion batteries in mainland China is at the international leading level, the core material system has completely independent intellectual property rights, and related enterprises are orderly promoting the production of key materials, cell design and development, modular integration and management, and promoting the commercialization of sodium-ion batteries.
The industrial chain of sodium batteries is also constantly improving. At the upstream material end, Ronbay Technology has a layout in sodium-ion battery cathode material technology and solid-state battery cathode material technology; Xiangfenghua has successfully developed a high-performance hard carbon anode material, which is currently being tested; polyfluoride has mass-produced and sold sodium hexafluorophosphate. Battery suppliers in the midstream, including CATL, Sunwoda and Penghui Energy, have accelerated the research of sodium-ion battery technology. In terms of downstream applications, sodium-ion batteries have been successfully applied in energy storage, mechanical engineering, low-speed electric vehicles and other fields. Hu Yongsheng believes that the sodium-ion battery industry will establish a complete industrial chain within 3 years.
"Supplement" not "substitute"
The industry generally believes that sodium-ion batteries and lithium-ion batteries are "complementary" rather than "alternative" relationships. Due to the low energy density of sodium-ion batteries, they are more suitable for application in medium and low-speed electric vehicles and large-scale energy storage.
Previously, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology made it clear that lithium-ion batteries, sodium-ion batteries and other new batteries are "ballast stones to promote the development of the new energy industry", and it is expected that with the increase of investment in the industry, the maturity of technology, and the gradual improvement of the industrial chain, cost-effective sodium-ion batteries are expected to become an important supplement to lithium-ion batteries, especially in the field of stationary energy storage. In recent years, a number of national policies have frequently encouraged the development of sodium-ion batteries, injecting a cardiotonic agent into the development of the industry.
Hu Yongsheng believes that the requirements for batteries are mainly divided into higher capacity, faster charging speed, safer and lower cost. In his view, in addition to the higher capacity can not be satisfied temporarily, other aspects are the advantages of sodium-ion batteries. At this stage, sodium-ion battery products will be mainly used in application scenarios below 150 Watt Hours /kg, which can alleviate the limited development of energy storage batteries caused by the shortage of lithium resources to a certain extent.
"There is no obvious bottleneck in the large-scale mass production of sodium-ion batteries, and it will quickly seize the market with its own characteristics in specific markets." Hu Yongsheng believes that the positioning of sodium-ion batteries is the most economical high-safety energy storage battery, and after scale, the performance of lithium-ion batteries will be realized at the price of lead-acid batteries.
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Produced by | China Energy News (ID:cnenergy)
Responsible editor 丨 Yan Zhiqiang