Sodium ion batteries become the capital market "new favorite" in the preemptive layout?

Focus on the current round of lithium battery price rise, mainly attributed to the contradiction between supply and demand of battery raw materials, in order to alleviate the tight supply of lithium resources, sodium ion batteries have come to the fore this year, providing more power options for the further development of the new energy industry.

On April 1, the company found that Huawei Harper's Shenzhen Hubble Technology Investment Partnership (limited partnership) has a stake of about 13.33%, and its registered capital has increased to 30.94995 million yuan.

In March this year, Zhongna Energy, a sodium ion battery company, announced that it had completed a new round of financing exclusively led by country Garden Venture Capital, which was mainly used to expand the R & D and mass production technical team. Internationally, Altris, a sodium ion battery company headquartered in Uppsala, Sweden, also announced that it had recently raised 9.6 million euros in round A financing to ensure that Altris expanded the production scale of its innovative battery cathode material Fennac to 2000 tons, so that further development of 1GWh sodium ion batteries could be carried out. The financing round is funded by Stockholm-based Molindo Energy, Northvolt, a Swedish battery developer and manufacturer, and EIT InnoEnergy, which is co-financed by the European Union.

Policy heating up

Sodium ion batteries have become the "new darling" of the capital market, and the policy level continues to release positive signals:

On April 2, the "14th five-year Plan for Scientific and technological Innovation in the Energy Field" issued by the National Energy Administration and the Ministry of Science and Technology proposes to develop long-life, low-cost and high-safety lithium-ion batteries in the field of energy storage technology. break through the balance and energy management technology of special modules for lead-carbon batteries, and carry out research on key materials, stack design and integrated design of system modules for high-power liquid flow batteries. Research and development of a new generation of high-performance energy storage technologies, such as sodium ion batteries, liquid metal batteries, sodium-sulfur batteries, solid-state lithium-ion batteries, energy storage lithium-sulfur batteries and water batteries, and develop energy storage technologies such as heat storage and cold storage, hydrogen storage and mechanical energy storage.

On March 21, the implementation Plan for the Development of New Energy Storage issued by the National Development and Reform Commission and the Energy Bureau proposed to carry out research on key core technologies, equipment and integrated optimization design, such as sodium ion battery, new lithium ion battery, lead-carbon battery, liquid flow battery, compressed air, hydrogen (ammonia) energy storage, thermal (cold) energy storage, and so on, focusing on energy storage technologies such as superconductors and supercapacitors. Develop and reserve a new generation of high energy density energy storage technologies such as liquid metal batteries, solid-state lithium-ion batteries and metal-air batteries.

As early as last August, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said that it would organize relevant standards research institutions to timely carry out the formulation of sodium ion battery standards to guide the healthy and orderly development of the industry. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology will strengthen the layout in the relevant policy documents such as the 14th five-year Plan, and start from many aspects, such as promoting cutting-edge technology, perfecting supporting policies, and opening up market applications, to do a good job in top-level design and improve industrial policies. overall planning to guide the high-quality development of the sodium ion battery industry. The Ministry of Science and Technology will implement the key project of "Energy Storage and Smart Grid Technology" during the 14th five-year Plan period, and regard sodium ion battery technology as a sub-task, in order to further promote the scale and low cost of sodium ion batteries and improve the comprehensive performance.

The wind is about to rise

In addition to the frequent warm wind at the policy level, companies are also taking the lead in laying out the sodium ion battery market:

On April 6th, Baichuan (002455) said that the company has carried out related research and development of sodium ion battery technology, and the company's technical team will continue to pay attention to the development trend of sodium ion battery.

On April 2, PetroChina issued three bidding documents related to energy storage, including the development and application of sodium ion batteries and energy storage devices, according to CNPC's tendering and bidding network.

On March 31st, Xinwanda (300207) said that the company currently has related technology research and development and technical reserves in sodium ion battery and cobalt-free battery, and the company is also actively discussing with customers the cooperation and application of sodium ion battery and cobalt-free battery.

On March 31st, New Zebang (300037) said that the company already has the technical reserve to produce sodium ion battery electrolyte, but because the supply system of sodium hexafluorophosphate is not as mature as lithium hexafluorophosphate, and the energy density of sodium ion battery is still larger than that of lithium battery, the application range of sodium ion battery electrolyte is limited. It is expected that there will not be large-scale commercial application in the next 3-5 years. At present, the company is mainly in the sample delivery stage.

On March 30th, Ningde Times (300750) was selected by time magazine (TIME)'s "Top 100 most influential companies" list. Time magazine believes that Ningde era revolutionized the introduction of sodium ion batteries, and will form a basic industrial chain in 2023. On the 25th, Ningde Times related Company Bang Pu recycled a new piece of patent information related to sodium ion battery, involving the preparation method of positive and negative electrode materials of sodium ion battery, comprehensive recovery method and so on.

On March 29th, Rongbai Technology (688005) said that the company is actively carrying out the technical iteration and production line construction of sodium ion battery manganese iron Prussian white and layered oxide cathode materials, and is expected to achieve ton output in 2022 and 100 tons in 2023.

On March 29th, Zhongwei (300919) said that in addition to the existing nickel series and cobalt series technical routes, the company is also actively laying out the technical routes of ferrophosphorus, manganese and sodium systems.

On March 24th, three Gorges Energy (600905) said that the world's first large-scale production line for sodium ion batteries in cooperation with China Science and Technology Hainna is under orderly construction and is expected to be put into production in 2022.

On March 7th, * ST Lion (002684) said that in addition to key projects, the company plans to invest some money in the development of sodium ion battery technology, solid-liquid ternary lithium battery, high voltage electrolyte technology and so on.

On March 4th, Huayang (600348) said that at present, the sodium ion battery project is progressing normally as planned, the battery core project started by the company matches the scale of the first phase of the project of positive and negative materials for sodium ion battery, the pack battery production line is also built according to the scale of the first phase of materials, and the sodium ion pack battery production line is expected to be put into production by the end of the third quarter.

In addition to the above enterprises, at present, Penghui Energy, Zhenhua New Materials, Dow Technology, long-term Lithium Science, Sichuan Changhong, the Great Wall of China, Shandong Zhanggu, Green Mei, Zhenyu Science and Technology, Dingsheng New Materials, Zhejiang Medicine, Lizhong Group, Xiang Fenghua, Yongtai Technology and other companies are also actively laying out the technology in the field of sodium ion batteries.

Recently, the relevant official of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said that by the end of the first quarter of this year, the cumulative promotion of new energy vehicles in China is expected to exceed 10 million. New progress has been made in key technologies of new energy vehicles, and positive progress has been made in sodium ion batteries and modular power exchange.

In addition, according to the "White Paper on the Development of Sodium Ion Battery Industry in China (2022)" jointly issued by research institutions EVTank, Ivy Economic Research Institute and China Battery Industry Research Institute, considering the demand for batteries in various potential application scenarios of sodium ion batteries, theoretically, in the case of 100% penetration, the market space of sodium ion batteries in 2026 can reach 369.5GWh, and the theoretical market size may reach 150 billion yuan. At the same time, EVTank predicts that the industrialization of sodium ion batteries will be achieved after 2025.

The best time to plant a tree was ten years ago, followed by now. It is undeniable that at the present stage, the industrialization of sodium ion batteries is facing difficulties such as energy density, cycle life, supporting industry chain, and so on, but the representatives of the above-mentioned enterprises are now actively exploring and developing, breaking through the difficult problem of "sticking neck" and preemptively laying out the next tuyere of the battery. maybe it's the best time.