GM To Announce New Uses For Old Batteries

While battery-car sales have been growing at a slower pace than proponents have projected, that still means more than 100,000 new battery packs will be put on the road in the U.S. this year. What to do with them when those vehicles are ready to be scrapped has become an increasingly big concern.

General Motors announced plans on June 23 that would create new uses for old batteries. The maker had hinted at applications that could include using recycled batteries from its Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid for power utility back-up systems.

GM will soon begin production of a second-generation Volt for the 2016 model-year. The maker also is readying an all-new electric vehicle, the Chevrolet Bolt, which will be powered by roughly twice as many batteries as most pure EVs on the road today.

GM has been working with both Duke Energy, a major energy provider, and electric grid equipment manufacturer ABB Group on ways to reuse the lithium-ion batteries in its electric vehicles. That’s "the Holy Grail," Duke’s Technology Project Manager Dan Sowder said during a 2012 joint news conference, because it could "help enable the safe and reliable integration of renewable energy into the grid."

During that event, GM and its partners showed off a prototype system that packed a number of old Volt batteries together to serve as a grid backup and leveling system. It could serve four or more homes at one time, both reducing demand on the grid during times of peak demand and providing a steady flow of power even in the event of a regional blackout.

GM, Duke, and ABB also raised the possibility of creating entire "farms" of old batteries that could serve a factory, a shopping center, or even an entire neighborhood.

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