#SodiumIonBatteries offer an alternative to tricky #lithium

Oct 26th 2023

Excerpt: "Fortunately, lithium is not the only game in town. As we report this week, a clutch of firms are making batteries based on sodium, lithium’s elemental cousin. Since sodium’s chemical properties are very similar to those of lithium, it too makes for good batteries. And sodium, which is found in the salt in #seawater, is thousands of times more abundant on Earth than lithium and cheaper to get at. Most of the companies using sodium to make batteries today are also Chinese. But pursuing the technology in the West might be a surer route to energy security than relying heavily on lithium.

"Besides its abundance, sodium has other advantages. The best lithium batteries use #cobalt and #nickel in their electrodes. Nickel, like lithium, is in short supply. #Mining it on land is #EnvironmentallyDestructive. Proposals to grab it from the #seabed instead have caused rows. A good deal of the world’s cobalt, meanwhile, is extracted from small mines in the #DemocraticRepublicOfCongo, where #ChildLabour is common and working conditions are dire. Sodium batteries, by contrast, can use #electrodes built from #iron and #manganese [and wood #lignin], which are plentiful and uncontroversial. Since the chemical components are cheap, a scaled-up industry should be able to produce batteries that cost less than their lithium counterparts.

"Sodium is not a perfect replacement for lithium. It is heavier, meaning sodium batteries will weigh more than lithium ones of an equivalent capacity. That is likely to rule them out in some cases where lightness is paramount. But for other applications, such as #GridStorage or #HomeBatteries, weight is irrelevant. Several Chinese carmakers are even beginning to put sodium batteries in #ElectricVehicles."

Read more:
https://www.economist.com/leaders/2023/10/26/sodium-batteries-offer-an-alternative-to-tricky-lithium

Archived version:
https://archive.ph/7x6JX

#SolarPunkSunday #EnergyStorage #SodiumIon #NewTechnology #GiantLeap #Reuse #WasteReuse #NoLithiumMining #NoMining

A French startup is extracting nickel without digging a single hole. Using plants that absorb metal through their roots, they've successfully harvested nickel in just a few months—leaving the soil intact and ecosystems untouched. It's phytomining, and it could change how we source rare metals.

#Phytomining #GreenTech #SustainableMining #Nickel #Innovation #France

New method converts old phones and paper industry #waste into #GreenBattery tech

Scientists have created a sustainable, cost-effective, and highly efficient solution that promotes a #CircularEconomy while supporting the transition to greener #EnergyStorage.

By
Mrigakshi Dixit
Feb 20, 2026 06:59 AM EST

"A new sustainable method turns discarded #MobilePhoneBatteries and industrial lignin into a powerhouse material for #SodiumIon batteries.

"It is a stunning example of circular economy innovation. Rather than letting these materials sit in #landfills or go up in smoke, the team from China is giving the waste a high-tech second life.

"When tested as a sodium-ion battery anode, this composite of #nickel-#cobalt sulfides and #lignin-derived carbon delivered electrochemical results."

Read more:
https://interestingengineering.com/energy/battery-material-from-old-phone-batteries

#SolarPunkSunday #CellPhoneBatteries #Reuse #SodiumIonBatteries #NewTechnology #GiantLeap #EWaste #EWasteRecycling #EWasteReuse

Charging a three-cell nickel-based battery pack with a Li-Ion charger [pdf]

https://www.ti.com/lit/an/slyt468/slyt468.pdf

#HackerNews #Charging #Nickel-Based #Batteries #Li-Ion #Charger #Battery #Technology #PDF

schlimm, wie in den USA die Demokratie abgeschafft wird,

inzwischen hier: https://archive.is/ER78E (ein lesenswerter Artikel in der sz)

Auch eine Sache, die dazu passt: im Deutschen Literaturfonds werden die Anträge von Gunther Nickel geprüft, der Mitbegründer des Hayek-Clubs ist, 2013 in der nazi-Partei war und regelmäßig in rechten, querfrontlerischen Zeitschriften wie tumult und casablanca schreibt. Er ist auch Professor und so weiter.

#Kulturkampf
#Weimer
#Nickel

Indonesia tightens control on nickel as the US and China scramble for minerals

https://misryoum.com/us/technology/indonesia-tightens-control-on-nickel-as-the-us/

HANOI, Vietnam -- Indonesia is tightening state control over the world’s largest nickel supply after years of betting the metal would anchor a homegrown electric-vehicle industry, and just as global demand begins shifting away from heavy reliance on nickel.The move...

#Indonesia #tightens #control #nickel #the #and #China #scramble #for #minerals #US_News_Hub #misryoum_com

Latest update to the #NICKEL mailing list is out https://buttondown.com/nickel/archive/taking-it-back/

Probably the most exciting part to me is the switch to these icons and adding text labels to them (you can see what they looked like before at the link).

I wish there were modern iconsets that looked like these (Jonas Rask’s Danish set), optimized for hi-dpi displays but I'll rock with these until something better comes along.

(The royal) we dictate what the status quo is online. SVG icons are cool but where's the personality? The whimsy? I'm tired boss, gimme the good shit (hella whimsy).

Feu vert pour la raffinerie classée Seveso au bord de l'eau : c’est une #raffinerie de #cobalt et de #nickel, classée #Seveso seuil haut, qui pourrait avoir les pieds dans l’eau. Ce projet baptisé #Emme https://www.emme-sas.com/ a reçu un avis favorable à son implantation Une enquête publique avait pourtant reçu 85 % d’avis défavorables https://reporterre.net/Feu-vert-pour-la-raffinerie-classee-Seveso-dans-une-zone-inondable?__cf_chl_tk=DfIqXhAumPzMv5sWG61uCaYoB9MeXgy3_7ibVyCwnjA-1771873449-1.0.1.1-yU1AkGcxqYISCpAhy0.fCetXr5kfiLK89uTNrkgaSnU

#mines #innondation

The music I uploaded to Bandcamp *checks notes* 16 years ago has bit rot (tracks don't play their full length) so I gotta re-upload, but not before I recreate the Acid Pro projects in Ableton...and try to find replacement VSTs for some effects.

I'm also going to try my hand at creating visualizers so I have interesting videos to also publish on #NICKEL. Most of my songs are less than 5 minutes and the ones that extend, they'll have fade outs.