Sodium is a much more plentiful element.
Revolutionizing Renewables: How Sodium-Ion Batteries Are Changing the Game
As society shifts away from fossil fuels, the demand for batteries is surging. Concurrently, this surge is likely to lead to a scarcity of lithium and cobalt, essential elements in prevalent battery types. An alternative solution could be sodium-ion batteries, which primarily utilize table salt and biomass derived from the forestry sector as their raw materials.
Now, researchers from Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, show that these sodium-ion batteries have an equivalent climate impact as their lithium-ion counterparts – without the risk of running out of raw materials.
“The materials we use in the batteries of the future will be important in order to be able to switch to renewable energy and a fossil-free vehicle fleet,” says Rickard Arvidsson, Associate Professor of Environmental Systems Analysis at Chalmers.
According to the European Commission’s Critical Raw Materials Act, the demand for critical raw battery materials is expected to increase exponentially as EU countries transition to renewable energy systems and electric vehicles. The green transition will also require more local production of batteries and other new fossil-free technologies, and a steady supply of raw materials is needed to meet demand. At the same time, such production carries a high risk of supply disruptions, due to the limited number of sources for raw materials.
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https://scitechdaily.com/revolutionizing-renewables-how-sodium-ion-batteries-are-changing-the-game/
Of course the rational solution would be to abandon our car culture and build energy networks that don't require batteries.
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