Sodium-Ion Batteries Were Supposed to Be the Budget Option. Two New Studies Say Hold On a Second.

Everybody assumed sodium-ion could never compete with lithium on performance because sodium ions are bigger, heavier, and slower. Turns out the ions were fine. The electrodes were the bottleneck. Research from Tokyo University of Science and Germany's Federal Institute for Materials Research shows that fixing how hard carbon anodes are built lets sodium charge at rates comparable to lithium in graphite. CATL is already putting sodium-ion cells in passenger cars. BYD is accelerating development. The chemistry was always capable. We just needed better engineering around it.