Out the gate, sodium ion advantages are so significant that unless there is some surprise show-stopper it will likely become the dominant energy storage medium.
Crustal abundance up to 1000x that of lithium - pretty much every nation has effectively unlimited supply, it's no longer a barrier or a geographically limited resource like lithium.
No significant damage going down to 0V, can even be stored at 0V - much safer than lithium which gets excitable once out of its prefered voltage range.
Cold weather performance down to -30C - northern latitude users don't have as much range anxiety in the winter.
Basically, the only problem I see is that companies that have made significant long-term investments in lithium could take a big hit. Countries that banked on their lithium reserves as a key future resource for will have to adjust their strategy.
Lithium batteries will likely still have a place in the high performance realm but but for the majority of run-of-the-mill applications - everything from customer electronics to EVs to offgrid storage - it's hard to see how sodium-ion wouldn't quickly replace it.
Energy density matters a lot for many applications, including customer electroncs and EVs. Sodium ion is at a fundamental disadvantage (sodium is heavier than lithium).
I don't doubt that sodium ion has a place... but whether it takes over as the dominant battery type for portable applications strikes me as very dependent on the future of lithium extraction. It seems like a place that has a lot of room to grow more efficient and thus more competitive on cost.
No mention of degradation as a result of recharge cycles. So many of my electronic devices have had to be disposed of because the battery would no longer hold a charge. This is also a big factor in EVs and their loss of value over time.
It is a big issue only for the ignorant (which is great for those that buy used). EV batteries are warranted for 60%-70% of capacity at eight years, which means most manufacturers expect batteries to do better, and actual real world experience shows much better.
It is impossible for sodium-ion batteries to reach the same energy density as the best lithium-ion batteries.
So lithium-ion batteries will never be replaced in smartphones or laptops by sodium-ion batteries.
But there are plenty of applications where the energy density of sodium-ion batteries is sufficient. Eventually sodium-ion batteries will be much cheaper and this is why they will replace lithium-ion batteries in all cheap cars and for most stationary energy storage (except when lower auto-discharge is desired).
For the same amount of stored energy, one needs a triple mass of sodium vs. lithium.
However, sodium-ion batteries and lithium-ion batteries do not have metal electrodes (because for now it is not known how to ensure that those will survive an acceptable number of cycles), so the actual mass and volume of the electrodes are significantly greater than that of the sodium or lithium that is used.
Because of that, the difference in energy densities is much lower than the mass ratio seems to imply.
The parent article claims that the energy density of the Na-ion batteries is in the same range with that of the LFP batteries (i.e. lower than that of the Li-ion batteries with Ni or Co based electrodes).
Crustal abundance up to 1000x that of lithium - pretty much every nation has effectively unlimited supply, it's no longer a barrier or a geographically limited resource like lithium.
No significant damage going down to 0V, can even be stored at 0V - much safer than lithium which gets excitable once out of its prefered voltage range.
Cold weather performance down to -30C - northern latitude users don't have as much range anxiety in the winter.
Basically, the only problem I see is that companies that have made significant long-term investments in lithium could take a big hit. Countries that banked on their lithium reserves as a key future resource for will have to adjust their strategy.
Lithium batteries will likely still have a place in the high performance realm but but for the majority of run-of-the-mill applications - everything from customer electronics to EVs to offgrid storage - it's hard to see how sodium-ion wouldn't quickly replace it.