Toyota Motor Corp. has developed a storage battery that combines used nickel-hydride cells from batteries in hybrid vehicles to recycle them for use by households and companies.
The automaker will start testing the efficiency of the storage battery, which is equivalent to five hybrid vehicle cells, by installing it at a plant in Kitakyushu in March. It plans to conduct another test at a dealer in Tokai, Aichi Prefecture.
Toyota had already started chemically treating used hybrid vehicle batteries with a view to recycling them, but even untreated batteries are thought to have the potential to be reused as stationary storage batteries.
The company said that when the storage cells become worn out, it will chemically treat them so they can be reused in hybrid vehicles.