Manufacturing of Key materials for Sodium Batteries

Offentlig prosjektsammendrag

Sodium-ion batteries (SIBs) are a highly promising battery technology due to their numerous advantages. Unlike lithium-ion batteries (LIBs), SIBs are nonflammable and can operate well in colder temperatures. Additionally, sodium is an abundant and affordable resource, making SIBs a more cost-effective and environmentally-friendly option than LIBs. However, SIBs have lower energy density than LIBs, making them less viable commercially. Recent studies have shown that using carbon nanotubes (CNTs) can significantly improve the performance of LIBs by increasing the conductive pathways and improving diffusion response, resulting in higher energy and power densities. This project aims to develop, optimize and test the use of newly developed CNTs in SIBs to increase their performance and make them lighter, more compact, and with higher energy density. If successful and fully commercialized, this technology has the potential to revolutionize various industries such as electric vehicles, renewable energy, grid-level applications, consumer electronics, and power backup. The realization of this project will pave the way for SIBs to fulfill future energy demands and reduce the dependence on LIBs, thus reducing the scarcity of rare earth metals.