Batteries
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Energy storage: top conclusions into batteries?
Thunder Said Energy is a research firm focused on economic opportunities that can drive the energy transition. Our top ten conclusions into batteries and energy storage are summarized below, looking across all of our research.
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Sodium ion batteries: comparing costs versus LFP?
Sodium is 1,000x more abundant than lithium in the Earth’s crust and 99% cheaper. So will sodium ion batteries disrupt lithium ion batteries? Not until lithium carbonate prices treble to $40/kg. Or novel SIB electrode materials emerge. This 16-page SIB deep-dive de-risks our lithium market outlook.
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Renewables plus batteries: co-deployments over time?
More and more renewables projects are being co-developed with battery storage. On average, projects in 2026-30 that codeploy batteries will supplement each MW of renewables capacity with 0.8MW of battery capacity, which in turn offered 4-hours of energy storage per MW of battery capacity, for 3.3 MWH of energy storage per MW of renewables.
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CATL: sodium ion battery breakthrough?
Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Limited (CATL) is a Chinese battery manufacturer, HQ’d in Fusian, founded in 2011, with >30,000 employees. It may produce as many as one-third of all the lithium ion batteries in the world. This data-file assesses whether it has made a breakthrough in sodium ion batteries.
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Grid-scale battery costs: the economics?
Grid-scale batteries are envisaged to store up excess renewable electricity and re-release it later. Grid-scale battery costs are modeled at 17c/kWh in our base case, which is the ‘storage spread’ that a LFP lithium ion battery must charge to earn a 10% IRR off c$1,000/kW installed capex costs. Other batteries can be compared in the…
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Energy storage: to infinity and beyond?
Lithium ion batteries are now so deeply entrenched that we doubt any new electrochemistry can supplant them. This 23-page report asks where are the opportunities now in batteries? Could any futuristic batteries with quasi-infinite capacity, such as quantum batteries, power inter-seasonal storage or long-distance aviation?
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Battery integrators: leading companies in BESS?
A dozen companies act as the “battery integrators” for 90% of all grid-scale battery storage systems (BESS), packaging lithium ion cells into fully functional, containerized modules, which can be deployed and grid-connected. 2025 economics included over $30bn of revenues, $250/kWh selling prices and 8.5% operating margins. But competition is intensifying.
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Thermal energy storage: cost model?
This data-file captures the costs of thermal energy storage, buying renewable electricity, heating up a storage media, then releasing the heat for industrial, commercial or residential use. Our base case requires 13.5 c/kWh-th for a 10% IRR using molten salt or sand, and as little as 5c/kWh-th when using low-cost graphite/petcoke modules.
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Global lithium production: by project, by country, by resource?
Global lithium production, by project, by country, by resource type, and over time, are aggregated in this data-file, by tabulating details of each project. There is spare capacity in 2026, especially from Australian mine projects, but the current project pipeline sugggests a 20-30% market deficit in 2030-35.
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Can solar provide round-the-clock power for data-centers?
This 15-page report models the costs of powering AI data centers, and other round-the-clock loads, using only solar and batteries, plus a “penalty” of 100-600 c/kWh for unmet demand. In some locations, solar+batteries will out-compete gas in the future? But an ocean of excess power gets thrown out?
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