A stunning number of electric vehicle, battery factories are being canceled

[Bluetus]

19. Sodium and Lithium both have 1 valence electron

So their charging properties should be similar. The main difference is that sodium has much greater atomic weight (I.e. more dead weight for that one productive electron).

However, charging speed depends on many factors. And at the same time CATL, BYD and others are moving to sodium, they are also working toward solid state or semi-solid state packages, and some of those can tolerate a much faster charging rate.

So far, Na-ion batteries should be considered experimental. There are a few EVs in production in China, but they are small city cars with limited range. For the moment, practically all EVs use either NMC (expensive, best range) or LFP (cheaper). It is common to have one model use LFP for lower trim levels and NMC for higher trim levels. By 2030, I expect lower priced cars will be mostly using Na-ion and the higher priced models using lithium, but in a solid state format.

The key thing for Americans to understand is that this is dominated by the CHinese, and to a lesser degree Korea and Japan. Tesla has never been a battery player. They already replied on Panasonic, and more recently have to buy a lot of product from CATL. This is all a direct result of the Limbaugh/Fox/Ailes RW machine that fought every attempt to drive energy leadership in the US. Now we are screwed. China will dominate this area for the rest of anybody's life who is reading this in 2025.

Well done, MAGA people.