A Chinese scientist built a sodium battery that charges in 4 minutes. It could break China’s 75% lithium dependence.

TL;DR

Lu Yaxiang’s sodium battery charges in 4 minutes, retains 90% after 2,000 cycles. CATL and Gotion are scaling production. China imports 75% of its lithium.

Lu Yaxiang, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Physics, has spent a decade making sodium-ion batteries commercially viable. In April, he received China’s Youth May Fourth Medal, the country’s top honour for outstanding achievers under 35, for developing a sodium metal battery that charges in roughly four minutes, retains 90% capacity after 2,000 cycles, and works using a quasi-solid gel electrolyte that functions even when repeatedly bent.

The breakthrough matters because China imports 75% of its lithium. Sodium is 500 times more abundant, can be extracted from seawater, and costs a fraction of what lithium does. Lu’s work is part of a broader Chinese push to build battery technology that does not depend on foreign supply chains. Separately, Gotion...

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