Eco-Friendly Honda Recycles Hybrid Batteries

Honda is making driving a hybrid even more environmentally friendly by recycling nickel-metal hydride batteries.

Troy, Michigan (I-Newswire) March 15, 2013 - Germain Honda of Ann Arbor is proud to announce that Honda is taking the initiative to make driving a hybrid car – such as their famous Insight – a truly environmentally-friendly experience from beginning to end by recycling old hybrid batteries.

While the act of driving a hybrid is certainly better for the environment than driving a traditional gasoline engine, creating – and eventually disposing of – the battery that makes it all possible can actually be pretty harmful to the planet. It's a fact that every automaker has been aware of, but Honda is actually doing something about it.

Through a process called molten salt electrolysis, Honda is able to take old nickel-metal batteries and recoup metals that are over 99 percent pure, which is just as good as mining them fresh from the earth.

This process began with vehicles damaged irreparably by the Japan Earthquake, with the goal of implementing the batteries into the hybrid market since they could no longer be used in their original vehicles. After inspection by battery manufacturing experts JMC, they will be fit for new hybrid vehicles, and Honda will turn their focus to the literally hundreds of thousands of hybrid batteries on the road today, planning for when they will be recycled for the future models.

In addition to hybrid only options like the Insight, Honda offers hybrid powertrains on many of their new vehicles, including the sales-leading 2013 Accord and the IIHS's Top Safety Pick+ 2013 Civic, two of the most popular, easily affordable sedans on the market.

If that were not enough incentive for these two vehicles, each of them is part of Honda's initiative to redefine how drivers think of standard features, carrying equipment such as Bluetooth phone and audio streaming, SMS text messaging, a rearview camera, and Honda's unique i-MID touchscreen interface on even the base level LX trims.

To learn more about Honda's efforts as a green automaker, the current Honda hybrids available, or to set up a test drive of one of their well-equipped 2013 models, contact the sales team at Germain Honda of Ann Arbor. Their dealership is located at 2601 South State Street, and finance and sales experts are on site six days a week.