2021 roadmap for sodium-ion batteries

Abstract: Increasing concerns regarding the sustainability of lithium sources, due to their limited availability and consequent expected price increase, have raised awareness of the importance of developing alternative energy-storage candidates that can sustain the ever-growing energy demand. Furthermore, limitations on the availability of the transition metals used in the manufacturing of cathode materials, together with questionable mining practices, are driving development towards more sustainable elements. Given the uniformly high abundance and cost-effectiveness of sodium, as well as its very suitable redox potential (close to that of lithium), sodium-ion battery technology offers tremendous potential to be a counterpart to lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) in different application scenarios, such as stationary energy storage and low-cost vehicles. This potential is reflected by the major investments that are being made by industry in a wide variety of markets and in diverse material combinations. Despite the associated advantages of being a drop-in replacement for LIBs, there are remarkable differences in the physicochemical properties between sodium and lithium that give rise to different behaviours, for example, different coordination preferences in compounds, desolvation energies, or solubility of the solid–electrolyte interphase inorganic salt components. This demands a more detailed study of the underlying physical and chemical processes occurring in sodium-ion batteries and allows great scope for groundbreaking advances in the field, from lab-scale to scale-up. This roadmap provides an extensive review by experts in academia and industry of the current state of the art in 2021 and the different research directions and strategies currently underway to improve the performance of sodium-ion batteries. The aim is to provide an opinion with respect to the current challenges and opportunities, from the fundamental properties to the practical applications of this technology

Na2Ti3O7: An intercalation based anode for sodium-ion battery applications

10.1039/c2ta01057gJournal of Materials Chemistry A172653-266

Na2Ti6O13: A potential anode for grid-storage sodium-ion batteries

10.1039/c3cc44381gChemical Communications49677451-7453CHCO

Hydrothermally synthesized highly dispersed Na2Ti3O7 nanotubes and their photocatalytic degradation and H-2 evolution activity under UV and simulated solar light irradiation

Photocatalytic water splitting technologies are currently being considered for alternative energy sources. However, the strong demand for a high H-2 production rate will present conflicting requirements of excellent photoactivity and low-cost photocatalysts. The first alternative may be abundant nanostructured titanate-related materials as a photocatalyst. Here, we report highly dispersed Na2Ti3O7 nanotubes synthesized via a facile hydrothermal route for photocatalytic degradation of Rhodamine B (RhB) and the water splitting under UV-visible light irradiation. Compared with commercial TiO2, the nanostructured Na2Ti3O7 demonstrated excellent photodegradation and water splitting performance, thus addressing the need for low-cost photocatalysts. The as-synthesized Na2Ti3O7 nanotubes exhibited desirable photodegradation, and rate of H-2 production was 1,755 mu mol center dot g(-1)center dot h(-1) and 1,130 mu mol center dot g(-1)center dot h(-1) under UV and simulated solar light irradiation, respectively; the resulting as-synthesized Na2Ti3O7 nanotubes are active in UV light than that of visible light response