breve2d ago

Sodium-ion EV battery breakthrough delivers 11-min charging and 450 km range

https://electrek.co/2026/03/25/sodium-ion-ev-battery-delivers-11-min-charging-450-km-range/

Sodium-ion EV battery breakthrough delivers 11-min charging and 450 km range

The next generation of electric vehicle batteries is arriving, promising to be more efficient, safer, and lower cost. After another...

Electrek
Show threadcyberax2d ago

Just remember, the US Na-Ion battery startup died last year with _products_ _in_ _warehouses_ just because it couldn't get a UL certification. All it needed was a bridge loan.

And the government did nothing.

Show threadtrynumber9

>And the government did nothing.

Why didn't a private investment company, even venture capital, extend them a bridge loan? It seems like the type of technology that could have decent returns in licensing fees.

I ask this question because it seems odd to someone in the software world so flooded with startups that the government would be expected to intercede on behalf of a startup.

Mar 25 at 10:12pmWeb
Show threadcyberax2d ago

Apparently, there were shenanigans from investors/creditors. So the company got quietly carved up instead of going through a bankruptcy auction.

I'm looking forward to the eventual investigational report.

BTW, the company was Natron Energy.

Show threadwat100002d ago

Decent returns aren't enough for a risky investment, they need to be spectacular returns.

The benefit to the country as a whole is potentially large, but most of it wouldn't show up as profit for the company itself. I'm sure it would do quite well if it was successful, but the benefits to car manufacturers and to having this sort of technology on-shore would not translate into monetary returns on private investment. That's the sort of thing government intervention is good for.

Show threadtadfisher2d ago
In this case, Natron was focused on energy-storage for data centers, a sector which is ordinarily a prime recipient of government intervention.
Show threadadrian_b2d ago

While this article is about cars, there is another Chinese company that offers 50 MWh sodium-ion batteries for stationary energy storage.

While for cars sodium-ion batteries will never reach the energy per kilogram of the best lithium-ion batteries, for stationary use it makes absolutely no sense to use lithium batteries, because sodium batteries will become much cheaper when their production will be more mature, so they should always be preferred to lithium batteries.

Even for cars, sodium-ion batteries have a second advantage besides price, they retain their capacity and their charging speed down to much lower temperatures than lithium-ion batteries, so they will be preferred in cold climates.