Nevertheless, they won’t be broadly commercially out there for some time. BMZ has obtained to the stage of testing prototype cells in 26700 and 32140 codecs, with additional codecs in improvement. The corporate mentioned cells are already being made for particular clients’ initiatives, and capability exists to ship extra ought to demand come up, however sequence manufacturing is just not anticipated to start till summer season 2025, or thereabouts.
CEO and founder Sven Bauer mentioned the Na-ion know-how: “affords us and our clients distinctive new alternatives in addition to quickly rising market potential, and we’re trying ahead to breaking new floor collectively”.
Sodium-ion has theoretical benefits that would make it complementary to lithium-ion within the battery market, if not a direct competitor.
The vitality density of most varieties of lithium battery tends to be a lot increased than that of its newer counterparts, however on the flipside, sodium-ion batteries may very well be produced far more cheaply.
In the meantime, a change may allow a decoupling from the provision chains for lithium which might be topic to very large volatility and fluctuations in demand, from sectors that embrace electrical automobiles (EVs) and client electronics, in addition to stationary battery storage.
There may be a security benefit, with the much less reactive sodium cells not topic to dendrite formation that may trigger lithium cells to brief circuit, and in the end to thermal runaway.
“The sodium-ion know-how is the right resolution for functions the place vitality density is just not paramount,” BMZ Group CEO Bauer mentioned.
“This contains industrial and residential storage methods or industrial vehicles, similar to forklifts.”
Na-ion ‘anticipated to grow to be fashionable alternative’ for builders
As a part of our 12 months in Evaluate articles, on the finish of 2023, and looking out forward into this yr, Vitality-Storage.information canvassed views from various builders of BESS initiatives on the know-how tendencies they see arising.
“Storage applied sciences are all the time evolving, so it is best to maintain an eye fixed out for the event of sodium-ion batteries, which will be one of many few applied sciences capable of obtain a market share corresponding to lithium batteries, within the brief time period,” mentioned Julian Gerstner, head of vitality storage at Baywa r.e.
Gerstner famous that sodium-ion battery improvement is essentially within the R&D stage, however that the gadgets have been anticipated to “grow to be a preferred alternative for battery storage methods within the close to future” (Premium entry).
Apparently, different respondents together with Jeff Bishop, CEO of Key Seize Vitality, mentioned that newer tech like sodium-ion captures the creativeness and media consideration, however that advances in lithium-ion tech shouldn’t be ignored, as a result of that’s doubtless what is going to push the needle on stationary storage deployments.
In November final yr, sodium-ion battery agency Altris, in partnership with European battery mass manufacturing startup Northvolt, claimed a “breakthrough” in creating Na-ion batteries with 160Wh/kg vitality density.
Designed for stationary vitality storage functions, the vitality density of the pair’s battery tech compares favourably to the decrease finish of the 120 – 260Wh/kg vary sometimes anticipated of Li-ion gadgets.
Worth reporting company (PRA) Fastmarkets not too long ago wrote in a Visitor Weblog for this web site that sodium-ion and solid-state batteries have a possibility to achieve market share amid the lithium provide crunch. In China, building is reportedly underway on a 50MW/100MWh sodium-ion grid-scale battery storage system venture, within the nation’s Hubei province.
Once more, with that being mentioned, Li-ion doesn’t look prone to get knocked off its perch because the go-to know-how, particularly for longer vary EVs and even BESS installations in additional land-constrained areas.
BMZ’s Sven Bauer mentioned the corporate, which makes and sells full vitality storage options along with cells, racks and modules, invests round half of its income yearly into R&D actions, however the enthusiasm it has in direction of the potential of sodium-ion – or different new applied sciences – “doesn’t imply that we’re abandoning any current applied sciences”.
“As a pioneer in lithium-ion battery know-how, now we have made historical past on this planet of batteries, and we proceed to worth their unmatched vitality density. Because of our a few years of experience, we’re the business specialists who can provide clients sound recommendation on which cell chemistry to make use of for any given software.”
BMZ’s Na-ion gadgets are being made by its specialist lithium-ion battery cell manufacturing subsidiary, TerraE.