logoalt Hacker News

toomuchtodoyesterday at 11:15 PM1 replyview on HN

Sodium batteries have substantially reduced thermal runaway risk compared to lithium. Worst case, the ship sinks during a fire and the batteries are flooded. Charging infra is likely similar to existing EV ferry charging infra. Ship pulls into the berth and starts soaking the battery storage up to 1C up until departure. Could probably use a heat exchange and raw water available for battery cooling to maximize charge current curve, actively cooling the battery storage during charging.

https://www.phmsa.dot.gov/sites/phmsa.dot.gov/files/2023-04/...

https://old.reddit.com/r/electricvehicles/comments/1m8wlou/e...


Replies

aeonfoxtoday at 1:18 AM

Na-ion cells have roughly half the volumetric and gravimetric energy density of NMC, so it's double the weight and double the space. Apart from still being at least as—if not more—expensive as LFP, they also have a sloping voltage curve, vs lithium with is relatively flat, which poses problems for voltage conversion, and these engines are going to be taking kilovolts of power. So I think those problems would need to be solved first.