Drawing inspiration from the form and function of eggs has helped develop a cheap, high-capacity battery that will help integration of large-scale renewable energy generation into the power grid.

Their sodium-ion battery has a capacity close to double that of current sodium-ion technology and comparable to state-of-the-art and commonly used lithium-ion batteries.

A battery capable of packing large amounts of energy into small packages at low cost is a vital piece of the technology needed to integrate large-scale renewable energy generation – such as solar or wind farms – into the energy grid.

Batteries that use sodium are being developed as an attractive alternative to lithium because the materials are cheap, abundant and non-toxic.

“Sodium-ion batteries now offer the prospect of being the game-changer that allows distributed renewable energy supply to become a reality.”

The research team is further developing the technology to pave the way for commercial-scale application of sodium-ion batteries.

Read more here: University of Wollongong.