World's largest sodium-ion battery goes into operation

Hell yeah

I can't wait to see this headline again but about a bigger battery somewhere else

Nice. This seems to be the future that solves a lot of problems. Right now in Australia, we’re seriously entertaining building nuclear power plants for the first time ever, to provide base load power that renewables allegedly can’t. Large sodium batteries could help us avoid that.
- It's not just base load, turbines also provide grid stability. All the quick fluctuations as people turn things on and off are hard to load balance with solar, wind, or battery. A big spinning turbine has a lot of inertia. That helps keep thr grid at a constant frequency. As solar gets bigger and bigger we might need big solar powdered flywheel generators just to stabilize the grid.
- The LNP doesn't have a legitimate interest in transitioning to nuclear power or they would've begun over the last decade or so that they were in power.
  Instead they've proposed - now that they're in opposition - a technology which is banned at the Federal level and individually at the state level, because they know that gives them years of lead time before they ever have to begin the project.
  On top of that, all of the proposed sites are owned by companies who've already begun transitioning to renewable generation or renewable storage, and most of them are in states in which the state Premiers have publicly stated that they will not consider overturning their bans on nuclear power.
- Sounds like a way to waste loads of money and keep people on fossil fuels.
  Must be way cheaper to build more batteries and build out inertia. (Would still need backup power at this point though).
- Nuclear power should be expanded, but a lot, it is the only realistic way to replace fossil plats for base demand.
  And before anyone starts whining about "radiation scary", nuclear waste is a solved problem.
  You dig a hole deep into the bedrock, put the waste in dry casks, put the full drycasks in the hole, and backfill it with clay.
  Done, solved!
  A bigger radiation hazard is coal ash, from cosl power stations, they produce insane ammounts of ash which is radioactive.
  https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-radioactive-than-nuclear-waste/
  Storing coal ash is also a big problem:
  http://www.southeastcoalash.org/about-coal-ash/coal-ash-storage/
  Here is an interesting documentary about our fear of radiation, it is called Nuclear Nightmares, and was made by Horizon on BBC:
  https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7pqwo8

The draw-back with sodium batteries needs to be known, because they won't replace lithium anytime soon.

The density is lower, which is a great problem in EVs.

Not trying to be negative, but for an EV, or anything handheld, you get more weight for less power. Which is essential in a car, that uses more power the heavier it is.

What sodium IS the best at, are use cases where weight and size doesn't matter. Like with battery farms.

In this case they are much better than lithium.

While you're not wrong, sodium batteries coming on the market have 200 Wh/kg. This is comparable to where LFP batteries were a few years ago. That means the newer sodium batteries are about as good as what's in lots of EVs right now.
- The ceiling is going to be lower than with lithium. Sodium ions themselves weigh about 3 times more than lithium, for the same +1 charge. So it's not just that sodium is a certain number of years behind lithium. It's that it'll likely plateau at a point permanently behind where lithium will likely be.
Sodium could easily replace lithium in EV applications if people would acknowledge that only 2% of trips are more than 50 miles. Though it's probably moreso the auto industry's fault that people have this assumption they need to prepare for a three hundred mile journey on a moments notice.
If manufacturers were putting out cars that had four figure price tags with double digit ranges, they would become the best selling vehicles within a decade and no one would care if it was sodium, lithium, or sawdust. Of course, there is less profit to be made from smaller vehicles and so the corporations won't bother.
- That's assuming you don't have issues charging at where you live, which is a pretty big if for a lot of people. A 300 Mi charge would mean if you can't charge daily, you would be able to go a couple of days without having to do so.
- EV owner here. 50 miles is not practical, beacuse then I need another for the other 2% of trips that are longer than that. This also ignores detours or traffic jams, when google will try to reroute me over a longer, but faster route. Plus, the "50 miles" readout you get is always just an estimate and the real range depends on temperature, driving speed, start-stops and how much elevation you need to cover. Some 30km trips here cost me 50+ EV km because its all uphill in one direction. I usually add 30km to my trip as required charge, because when the battery reaches 25km the car starts to complain with a nervously blinking battery readout and a "Charge now!" message on the dashboard.
  "But then you just charge during the trip!" - Well this only work if i go somewhere where i know where to find RELIABLE chargers. I am well aware that there are good apps that show me charging locations, but getting a charging spot I can actually use is a different story:
  charging station can be used by someone else, or there is queue and each car will most likely charge for 30+ mins. Of course, sometimes some inconsiderate pricks will hog a spot untill their car is fully charged, even if it takes his frikkin tesla 2h
  charging stations close for repairs, sometimes for weeks
  some charging stations need an account or RFID-tag before you can use their (but not other) charging network
  other charging stations require you to bring your own cable
  some charging stations dont have the connector you need for your car
  some stations on the map are bogus, for example that one at my local volvo dealership that only exists to charge the showroom and customer cars, but is not accessible to the public.
  Not saying EVs are bad, but the charging infrastructure still needs some work to be reliable and accessible. Petrol stations always have some large, obnoxious signs on the side of the road that you cant miss; Charging stations are sometimes just a tiny grey box on a wall and a 5-space parking lot, or behind a building and you never notice it when driving by.
But for static storage, only price/kw matters.
- Price per kw and price per kwh stored. And price per kwh over the expected lifetime of the battery itself (longevity and reliability and safety and disposal will have to be factored into total cost of ownership).
Yeah I see these as the answer to the people who think solar energy is bad because the sun goes down.
What other benefits do they have? Do they have less wear or are cheaper per Wh to produce?
Or at least, about to be when production ramps up further?
- They are dirt cheap, don't have the fire safety issues as some lithium chemistries (not all lithium chemistries do that), and sodium is abundant.
- Article says operating temperature range. -20 to 60 C

the power station can be charged and discharged more than 300 times a year. A single charge can store up to 100,000 kWh of electricity and release electricity during the peak period of the power grid. It can meet the daily power needs of around 12,000 households and reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 13,000 tons annually.

Nice

Put one of these in every neighborhood please.

Check UK stories.
People leaving next to turbines hate them due to noise pollution.
- I’m talking about putting a sodium ion backup battery in every neighborhood. They don’t make loud noises. And they are great for storing energy produced by rooftop solar panels, easing grid stress, and backing up power when the lines go down.
- Well, shit. Better not build sodium ion batteries then.
- What's that got to do with the price of fish?
- People live on top of mountains?
  Were are this wind turbines being placed? I hiked to a farm once and had one at work.
  Now, I'm not saying they are silent but unless you put one in my back garden I never thought of them as loud.

That’s pretty neat.

According to Datang Group, the power station can be charged and discharged more than 300 times a year.

Well, nice, but "more than 300 times a year" is definitely a weird goal to define or a weird metric to brag about, right?

I mean, what in it's desig could be so critical that they wouldn't just say 'once daily' or something.

Does it require maintenance days when no cells are operational?

Maybe competitors are only up to 200 per year and these guys finally achieved 300 per year?

Doesn't California have some insane battery too?

Yes, but that is Lithium-ion. These batteries are Sodium-ion which are better for the environment and can potentially be made a lot cheaper.. It's still pretty new technology so it's not really in any consumer products yet.
- Sodium batteries are already in electric cars many months ago
  https://www.engadget.com/the-first-ev-with-a-lithium-free-sodium-battery-hits-the-road-in-january-214828536.html
  Also you could buy individual cells on AliExpress
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6zcI1GrkK4
- There are some electric vehicles so far, which is promising.
- Economy of scale matters, so does practicality. Which one is generally lasting longer per number of charges and what's the long term viability of both given the time they were build and the available tech at that time? I totally understand the greater availability of sodium vs lithium. However, will it last? Last time I read much about it, reliability was weak, charge capacity over time dropped drastically, and failures were high. (It has been a couple of years, so things may be changing. )
  Something new and shiney can be nifty, but past that, what is this? It seems like an expensive hood ornament that will rust in the rain. Lithium is expensive and toxic to mine, but so are all metals to some extent, and this has plenty.
  It seems like it's buying something 25% off on a $100 thing that won't last well. Sure, you saved $25 once, but you're buying 3 of them in the same time frame.

I love how these look like Lego pieces snapped onto a green base.

Even if all that is painted cement or something it is also just really refreshing to see architecture, especially the sort of necessity eyesore that tech architecture/engineering requires, also being mindfully the environment it will exist in to some degree. Even if it is only visual.

Hopefully we can soon get one as home batteries to extend the use of solar panels. Because I don't feel great about having a lithium battery that large in my house