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| In Changsha, deep in China’s interior, thousands of chemists, engineers and manufacturing workers are shaping the future of batteries. | 在位于中国内陆的长沙，数以千计的化工专业人员和制造工人正在塑造电池产业的未来。 |
| The city’s Central South University churns out the graduates who are advancing the technology, much as Stanford University molded the careers of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs who pioneered microchips. Across the Xiang River, vast factories mix minerals into the highly processed compounds that make rechargeable batteries possible. | 正如斯坦福大学塑造了开创微芯片产业的硅谷企业家的职业生涯，长沙中南大学培养出了推动电池技术发展的毕业生。在湘江对岸，大型工厂将矿物质混入高度加工的化合物中，成为制造充电电池的原料。 |
| These batteries, mostly made of lithium, have powered the rise of cellphones and other consumer electronics. They are transforming the auto industry and could soon start doing the same for solar panels and wind turbines crucial in the fight against climate change. China dominates their chemical refining and production. | 这种主要由锂制成的充电电池推动了手机和其他消费电子产品的兴起。它们给汽车行业带来巨变，并可能很快为太阳能电池板和风力涡轮机产业带来同样的变革，这些产业对于应对气候变化至关重要。中国主导了这种电池的精炼和生产。 |
| Now China is positioning itself to command the next big innovation in rechargeable batteries: replacing lithium with sodium, a far cheaper and more abundant material. | 而今，中国正在为引领充电电池的新一代重大创新做准备：用成本便宜得多、储备也丰富得多的钠取代锂。 |
| Sodium, found all over the world as part of salt, sells for 1 to 3 percent of the price of lithium and is chemically very similar. Recent breakthroughs mean that sodium batteries can now be recharged daily for years, chipping away at a key advantage of lithium batteries. The energy capacity of sodium batteries has also increased. | 钠属于盐的一部分，它随处可见，价格只有锂的1%到3%，但二者的化学性质非常接近。近来取得的突破意味着钠电池如今可以实现长期频繁充电，这削弱了锂电池的一个关键优势。钠电池的容量也有所提升。 |
| And sodium batteries come with a big advantage: They keep almost all of their charge when temperatures fall far below freezing, something lithium batteries typically do not do. | 而且钠电池还有一个很大的优势：当温度远低于冰点，它还可以保持几乎所有电量，这是锂电池通常无法做到的。 |
| In Changsha, graduates from Central South University’s leafy campus are working on sodium battery technology at nearby research laboratories run by companies including Germany’s BASF, the world’s biggest chemical maker. One of the first large factories for sodium battery chemicals is already under construction a few blocks away from the labs. | 在长沙，应届生们走出中南大学绿树成荫的校园，来到附近的研究实验室从事钠电池技术研究，这些实验室的运营者包括德国巴斯夫这样的全球最大化学制造商。而在几个街区之外，首批生产钠电池化学品的大型工厂之一已在建设中。 |
| Chinese battery executives said in interviews that they have figured out in the past year how to make sodium battery cells so similar to lithium ones that they can be made with the same equipment. Chinese giant CATL, the world’s largest manufacturer of electric car batteries, says it has discovered a way to use sodium cells and lithium cells in a single electric car’s battery pack, combining the low cost and weather resistance of sodium cells with the extended range of lithium cells. The company says it is now prepared to mass produce these mixed battery packs. | 中国电池行业高管在接受采访时表示，过去一年，他们已经研究出如何制造非常接近于锂电池的钠电池，甚至可以用同样的设备来制造。作为全球最大电动汽车电池制造商，中国巨头企业宁德时代声称，已经研究出办法，能将钠电池的低成本和耐候性与锂电池的续航能力相结合，在电动汽车单个电池组中钠锂混用。该公司表示，现已准备大规模投产这种混合电池组。 |
| “We are ready to industrialize it,” Huang Qisen, the deputy dean of CATL’s research institute, said in an interview at the company’s headquarters in Ningde, China. CATL, which is short for Contemporary Amperex Technology Ltd., relies partly on chemicals from Changsha and recently built its first large-scale sodium battery assembly line in Ningde. | “我们具备量产能力了，”宁德时代研究院副院长黄起森在该公司位于中国宁德的总部接受采访时表示。宁德时代全称为宁德时代新能源科技股份有限公司，其部分生产依赖于长沙化工产品，最近在宁德建成了第一条大型钠电池装配线。 |
| Multinational corporations are taking notice of sodium. | 全球跨国集团也开始关注到钠。 |
| “It will shave off the peak of demand for lithium,” said Mike Henry, the chief executive of BHP, the world’s largest mining company. “I am confident we will start seeing sodium replace lithium for certain applications.” | “这将削减锂的需求旺势，”全球最大的矿业公司必和必拓的首席执行官韩慕睿(Mike Henry)表示。“我确信我们将开始看到钠在某些应用场景取代锂。” |
| Research into using sodium for batteries began in earnest in the 1970s, led then by the United States. Japanese researchers made crucial advances a dozen years ago. Chinese companies have since taken the lead in commercializing the technology. | 将钠用于电池的研究始于上世纪70年代，当时的领导者是美国。十几年前，日本研究人员取得了重大进展。自那之后，中国企业率先将这项技术商业化。 |
| Out of 20 sodium battery factories now planned or already under construction around the world, 16 are in China, according to Benchmark Minerals, a consulting firm. In two years, China will have nearly 95 percent of the world’s capacity to make sodium batteries. Lithium battery production will still dwarf sodium battery output at that point, Benchmark predicts, but advances in sodium are accelerating. | 根据咨询公司基准矿业的数据，全球目前已规划或已建设的20家钠电池工厂中，16家都在中国。未来两年，中国的钠电池产能将占到全球近95%。基准矿业预测，届时锂电池产量虽然还会远高于钠电池，但后者正在迎头赶上。 |
| At next week’s Shanghai auto show, carmakers and battery producers are expected to announce plans for sodium batteries in at least some limited-range subcompact cars for the Chinese market. | 在下周的上海车展，汽车制造商和电池生产商预计将宣布在中国市场部分限量小型车上使用钠电池的计划。 |
| The most immediately promising use for sodium batteries is for electric grids, the networks of wires and towers that transmit electricity. Batteries for grids are a fast-growing market, especially in China. Tesla said this week that it would build a factory in Shanghai to make lithium batteries for energy providers. | 钠电池目前最具直接前景的用途是电网，即由输电电线和电塔构成的网络。电网级电池的市场增长迅猛，尤其在中国。特斯拉本周表示，将在上海建厂，为能源供应商生产锂电池。 |
| Sodium batteries need to be bigger than lithium ones to hold the same electrical charge. That is a problem for cars, which have limited space, but not for electricity grid storage. Utilities that switch from lithium to sodium can simply put twice as many big batteries in an empty lot near solar panels or wind turbines. | 要做到储电量相等，钠电池的体积就得比锂电池更大。这对空间有限的汽车来说是个挑战，但对电网储能来说却不是问题。电力设施只需在太阳能板或风力涡轮机附近的空地上放置两倍体积的电池，就能实现锂电池到钠电池的转换。 |
| Utilities around the world have an increasing appetite for massive amounts of battery storage as they move to climate-friendly sources like solar and wind. They need to be able to store energy while the sun shines and the wind blows, and then use it later as a replacement for electricity powered by coal or gas. | 随着世界各地的电力设施开始转向太阳能和风能等气候友好型能源，对大规模电池储能的需求也越来越大。这些电池要在有太阳和有风的时候储备能量，然后再用它们替代煤炭或天然气生产的电力。 |
| Electricity in one large Chinese province, Shandong, already sells for up to 20 times more in early evening, when demand is high, than at mid-day, when the grid is flooded with more solar power than factories and homes need. The power generation companies use lithium batteries to distribute their renewable electricity across more hours. | 山东是中国大省之一，在这里，一到傍晚用电高峰，电价会比中午高出20倍，然而在中午，电网里充满太阳能，远超工业和家用所需。电力公司可以依靠锂电池让可再生电力分配到更多时段。 |
| But some utilities, like Three Gorges Corporation in west-central China, are beginning to experiment with sodium batteries. Many provinces have begun requiring newly built solar or wind power farms to install enough batteries to store 10 to 20 percent of the electricity that they generate, said Frank Haugwitz, a consultant who specializes in China’s solar industry. | 但一些电力设施已经开始试验钠电池，比如中国西部的长江三峡集团。专门研究中国太阳能产业的顾问韩飞(Frank Haugwitz)表示，许多省份都出台规定，要求新建成的太阳能或风力发电站安装足够的电池，至少能储存10%到20%的发电量。 |
| CATL has installed lithium batteries the size of minivans at electric car charging stations in cities like Fuzhou. The batteries automatically charge whenever electricity is cheap, like overnight or when the sun is shining on the charging station’s rooftop solar panels, and are ready whenever motorists drive up to recharge. CATL is studying whether sodium can be used in such locations. | 宁德时代已在福州等城市的电动汽车充电站安装小型货车大小的锂电池。半夜电价低廉时，或充电站房顶的太阳能电池板获得光照时，这些电池会自动充能，供前来充电的司机随取随用。宁德时代正在研究钠在此类场景的使用。 |
| Unlike lithium batteries, the latest sodium batteries do not require scarce materials like cobalt, a mineral mined mainly in Africa under conditions that have alarmed human rights groups. The newest sodium batteries also do not require nickel, which comes mainly from mines in Indonesia, Russia and the Philippines. | 与锂电池不同，最新的钠电池无需用上钴这样的稀缺原料，这种矿物质主要在非洲开采，其开采条件令许多人权组织深感担忧。新一代钠电池也不需要镍，后者主要产自印尼、俄罗斯和菲律宾的矿场。 |
| Yet as China races toward leadership in sodium, it still faces challenges. For starters, there is where to get the sodium. | 不过，在中国在钠电池领域朝着领头羊地位迈进的同时，挑战仍然存在。首先就是从何处获取钠资源的问题。 |
| While salt is abundant, the United States accounts for over 90 percent of the world’s readily mined reserves for soda ash, the main industrial source of sodium. Deep under the southwestern Wyoming desert lies a vast deposit of soda ash, formed 50 million years ago. Soda ash there has long been extracted for America’s glass manufacturing industry. | 虽然盐的储量十分丰富，但美国占全球纯碱易开采储量上的90%以上，而纯碱正是钠的主要工业来源。在怀俄明州西南部沙漠的深处，埋藏着大量形成于5000万年前的纯碱沉积物。这里的纯碱一直被美国玻璃制造业用作原料。 |
| With minimal natural reserves of soda ash and a reluctance to rely on imports from the United States, China instead produces synthetic soda ash at chemical plants fueled by coal. | 由于纯碱的自然储量稀少，加之不愿依赖美国进口，中国在以煤为燃料的化工厂生产合成纯碱。 |
| China’s synthetic soda ash industry has a record of hazardous water pollution. That includes the collapse of a pile of alkali slag in east-central China in 2016 that washed away cars and fouled a major river. The country’s environment agency is working to clean up the industry. | 中国合成纯碱行业曾经引发水污染危害。比如2016年发生在中国中东部地区的碱矿渣坍塌事件，导致汽车被冲走，一条主要河流也被污染。中国环境机构正在努力整顿该行业。 |
| Another question hanging over sodium is whether lithium will remain costly. Lithium prices quadrupled from 2017 to last November, but have since dropped by two-thirds. | 围绕钠的另一个问题在于锂的价格是否仍将高居不下。从2017年到去年11月，锂的价格翻了两番，但此后又下跌了三分之二。 |
| There are also doubts about the durability of sodium batteries. Power companies want to see how sodium batteries perform for years outdoors, not just in labs, said David Fishman, a power sector consultant at Lantau Group, a consulting firm. | 也有人对钠电池的耐用性表示怀疑。咨询公司大屿山集团的电力行业顾问余德伟(David Fishman)表示，电力公司希望看到的是钠电池在实用场景中的长久性能表现，而不仅仅是实验室的结果。 |
| But Mr. Fishman and others are now watching sodium battery development closely. Demand for batteries is growing fast, and lithium is unlikely to remain the dominant material indefinitely. | 但如今，余德伟和其他人都在密切关注钠电池的研发进展。对电池的需求正在快速增长，锂不太可能无限期地占据主导地位。 |
| “Yes, sodium has a role,” said Mr. Henry of BHP. “China is at the forefront of driving research in this.” | “是的，钠能够派上用场，”必和必拓的韩慕睿说。“而中国正走在推动这方面研究的最前沿。” |
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