Last year, The Daily Star published a commentary on my observations of climate change over a span of several decades. Now that another year has passed, I’d like to update that column and offer some new thoughts.
In my prior commentary, titled “Observing Local Climate Change for 36 Years,” from the Sept. 14, 2024 edition of The Star, I warned that we were in a new climate regime, where the meaning of a “200-year storm” or a “500-year storm” was largely obsolete, because there is no longer any true reference for the climate conditions we are now experiencing. I also warned that we were likely to see local weather events beyond our imagining. Since that column, we have dodged a local weather disaster on the scale of the floods of 2006 and 2011, but we have seen catastrophic events around the country, notably the terrible flooding in western North Carolina from hurricane Helene, the wildfires in metro Los Angeles, and the Texas hill country flood.
More recently, Hurricane Melissa became one of the strongest storms ever recorded in the Atlantic basin, and possibly the most powerful, as it made landfall on the southern coast of Jamaica on Oct. 28. I say possibly because the crisp, near perfect circularity of the storm’s eyewall exceeded the capacity of the NOAA satellite algorithm to measure the storm’s intensity.
These events are happening with a frequency that was unimaginable only a few years ago. This non-linear acceleration will continue as long as we pump fossil fuel emissions into the atmosphere. Sadly, on a global scale, that is exactly what we’re doing. When I posted my prior column, the CO2 reading in parts per million at the Mona Loa Observatory for May 2024 was 427 parts per million. This May, the reading was 430.58 ppm — the greatest yearly increase in the history of record keeping. (In March of 1958, when George Keeling made his first measurement at Mona Loa, the CO2 in the atmosphere was 313 ppm.)
In my commentary last year, I made an appeal for us to set aside our NIMBY reflex and support local renewable development, both solar and wind. I also endorsed nuclear power as the best base load complement to renewables and cited Nobel Laureate Burton Richter’s assessment that wind and solar could provide 90% of the national grid, with nuclear supplying 10% to cover the problem of intermittency. I still believe nuclear is a safe complement to renewable power, but I have changed my thinking on its necessity. In truth, I do not believe we need nuclear power, because there is now a cheaper and safer option.
That option is batteries — not the lithium ion currently used in most electric vehicles, or the second-generation lithium iron used in back-up for homes and businesses. Today, the battery that is destined to be a global game changer is the sodium ion battery.
Sodium ion batteries have been around for at least a decade, but recent technical breakthroughs have transformed them into a power source that is truly wonderous. Consider these benefits:
Sodium batteries maintain efficiency in cold temperatures far better than current lithium ion or lithium iron batteries. This makes them ideally suited for winters in places like Upstate New York. The Chinese company CATL offers the Naxtra sodium ion battery, which performs with high efficiency at temperatures of minus 40 degrees Fahrenheit.
Because of their energy density, sodium batteries are comparable to lithium for battery energy storage, but are cheaper and safer. BYD, another Chinese company, offers the MC Cube-T sodium battery that provides 6.4 MWh of storage. That’s 64,000 watts of power! This unit fits into a 20-foot shipping container and is much cheaper than lithium batteries. What’s more, it performs better than lithium at both cold and hot temperature extremes, making it ideal for baseload storage for grids serving cities or even states.
Sodium batteries are available at much lower cost because the materials to make them are abundant and cheap. Another plus for sodium is the fact that they do not require bottleneck materials like lithium or cobalt, and no phosphorous — an element that is almost exclusively mined in one state in north Africa.
Sodium batteries are truly transformative in their potential to help the world decarbonize. Their significant lower cost, wider temperature range and faster recharge will accelerate trends that are already established. In cars, sodium will deliver EV range on parity with any gas-powered vehicles, with recharge in minutes. Internal combustion engines will make no sense when the EV alternative is cheaper, more reliable, lasts for hundreds of thousands of miles and maintains peak efficiency at temperatures of -40 F to +158 F. In a relatively short time, large trucks and even ships will be powered by sodium technology. It is happening in China already.
While great for transportation, sodium is equally transformative for base load storage. With cheap, compact, high efficiency battery units, homes and businesses, as well as towns and cities, can have dependable back-up power. When these batteries are linked with wind and solar generation, it is possible to have self-sufficient power indefinitely.
Climate heating is a serious concern. But renewable technology is advancing rapidly, including more affordable PVC panels, larger wind turbines and new battery innovations like sodium and next-generation designs. All that is needed now is the political will to deploy.