Yes, yes, but they are not really used at the time and they might never be for transportation except for niche cases since the energy density. But who knows, they are certainly a promising technology.
In the end it’s a matter of price, reliability, usability, etc.
And while sodium based batteries have a worse energy density (space and weight wise) than lithium based batteries, they seem to have advantages in other areas (eg. no. of charge cycles, price per kWh, no thermal runaway, basically unlimited amounts of cheap sodium available).
There are sodium batteries, so even without lithium and rare earth metals there are options
Yes, yes, but they are not really used at the time and they might never be for transportation except for niche cases since the energy density. But who knows, they are certainly a promising technology.
The real world begs to differ: https://www.livescience.com/technology/electric-vehicles/china-puts-a-sodium-ion-battery-into-an-ev-for-the-first-time-it-can-drive-248-miles-on-a-single-charge
In the end it’s a matter of price, reliability, usability, etc.
And while sodium based batteries have a worse energy density (space and weight wise) than lithium based batteries, they seem to have advantages in other areas (eg. no. of charge cycles, price per kWh, no thermal runaway, basically unlimited amounts of cheap sodium available).