At the supplier conference held on December 28, CATL announced that it will begin large-scale application of sodium-ion batteries in areas such as battery swapping, passenger vehicles, commercial vehicles, and energy storage starting in 2026, aiming to reduce reliance on lithium resources. It is reported that China's dependence on foreign lithium resources exceeds 70%, while its sodium resources account for 23% of the global reserves, with extraction costs only 1/20 of those for lithium. This cost advantage is particularly significant in the energy storage sector—when project capacity exceeds 10MWh, the full lifecycle cost of sodium-ion batteries is 28% lower than that of lithium batteries.