Ningde Shidai's world's first sodium-ion battery passes China's new national safety standard
CATL (Ningde Shidai) has officially confirmed that its new Qin-xin lithium battery is the first in the world to successfully pass certification under the new Chinese standard GB 38031-2025, which has new stringent safety requirements for electric vehicle batteries and comes into force on 1 July 2026. This standard strengthens the requirements for resistance to overheating, shock, fast charging and overcharging. The purpose of its implementation is to eliminate the risk of spontaneous combustion of electric vehicles.
Features of the Qin-xin sodium-ion battery:
Typically, lithium-ion technology is used in appliances, including electric vehicles. The automotive industry also continues to use lead-acid batteries. CATL used a different technology, replacing lithium with sodium. The new sodium-ion technology has a number of advantages over each of the older battery types.
Wider temperature range: The operating temperature range for sodium-ion batteries is -40°C to +70°C. This is a very useful feature for the northern regions, where batteries lose their capacity at low temperatures and charge and discharge cycles wear out their life faster. Lead-acid batteries also stop delivering their full power at low temperatures, which can be problematic when starting a car in winter. The new technology is claimed to retain up to 90% of its life even at -40°C.
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Economic feasibility: sodium-ion batteries are cheaper to manufacture than lithium-ion batteries and are less dependent on supply channels, as sodium is more abundant on our planet. As a result, these batteries are 61% cheaper than lead-acid batteries. Moreover, the life cycle of these batteries is more than 10,000 cycles, and the manufacturer's recommended service life is 8 years.
Safety: sodium-ion batteries do not cause a cascading chemical reaction, which results in a rapid release of energy and the combustion of lithium-ion batteries. While lithium-ion batteries can provide passive protection to the maximum extent possible by increasing the strength of the case, sodium-ion batteries are inherently safer.
Unlike lead-acid batteries, sodium-ion batteries must be equipped with a BMS board that monitors the charging and discharging processes, just like lithium-ion batteries. This allows the exact level of charge to be known and enables fast charging - 30-80% SOC in 10 minutes.
The first samples of sodium-ion batteries were manufactured in June 2025. These are 24 V batteries for trucks. The manufacturer plans to launch mass production by the end of the year.
Without independent evaluation and testing, it is too early to assess the veracity of all the above claims. Perhaps we are on the verge of a new technical revolution, as happened with silicon-carbon batteries in technology. Or perhaps the manufacturer's successes are somewhat exaggerated. In any case, it is good that scientists are conducting research in this area.
Source: www.ithome.com
