Volkswagen commissions second life battery-based energy storage systems for charging support

Modules from pre-production models of ID3 and ID4 have been used in what Volkswagen calls Power Storage Containers, a concept first developed and used by the sister brand Audi. The purpose is to show case the ability to use second life batteries in systems which can support charging of electric vehicles and optimise the power infrastructure at the charging station.

The now commissioned container is installed in Volkswagen’s Zwickau plant supporting four charging stations, each with an output of 150 kW, which can also be divided into two outputs of 75 kW. This means that up to eight vehicles can charge at the same time.

The container based power packs have been developed in a pilot project together with AW Automotive and Automotive Research. In total 96 modules from Volkswagen MEB packs with a net capacity of 570 kWh are used in each container. The system is relying on a solution that Audi already successfully used as part of the Audi charging hub in the urban area in Nuremberg. The container cubes consist of used lithium-ion batteries from disassembled Audi test vehicles that are used as buffer storage for direct-current (DC) electricity.

The use of second life batteries in EV charging support is rapidly becoming one of the area’s most common applications. Second life specialists such as Connected Energy and Batteryloop as well as charging companies such as EVGo have all been deployed systems based on second life batteries for peak shaving or to cut down on the demand.