Honda Launches Battery Swap Station for Electric Motorcycles in Japan

Honda's new battery charging and exchange station called the Honda Power Pack Exchanger e: (HPPEe:), was unveiled on Oct. 25, Tuesday, RideApart reported. The Tokyo Metropolitan Government will use the first HPPEe: to promote the usage of electric motorcycles within the city.

The station is compatible with the Mobile Power Pack e: (MPPe:), a removable battery that powers electric scooters or motorcycles. It has a variety of battery compartments, so people may swap out their dead batteries with fully charged MPPe: ones.

The battery pack swapping firm Gachaco, jointly founded by Honda, Yamaha, Kawasaki, and Suzuki, has now received the stations.

As a group, these four Japanese motorcycle manufacturers are often referred to as the "Big Four." They spearheaded the creation of a consortium to provide a standardized battery replacement method for all types of motorcycles.

How Does it Work

The procedure seems easy enough from the perspective of the consumer. Users can use their chip cards to connect with the HPPEe: station wirelessly. They may then swap out their drained battery for a fresh one by inserting it into an available slot and pulling a charged one out of another.

The slots for the batteries are slanted so that the user may insert and remove them quickly and easily.

Honda stated, via RideApart, that charging will start automatically when a used battery is plugged in. Also, the HPPEe: stations have built-in battery cooling features to prevent overheating.

Honda Has a Global Expansion Goal for the HPPEe:

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government is reportedly planning to establish Japan's first HPPEe: station in Tokyo, according to Electrek.

Honda is increasing its presence in India and will soon introduce a new electric moped, so additional charging stations there have also been installed in preparation.

There are currently electric rickshaws in India that utilize Honda's MPPe: batteries and make use of the switch stations. These rickshaws are very popular modes of transportation in India's larger cities.

Honda has great aspirations, but it is unclear where precisely they want to roll out its battery-switching facilities. They referred to the system as a battery infrastructure that may be extensively employed both in Japan and internationally.

Honda Is Not the First to Roll Out Battery Swap Stations

The concept of HPPEe: is similar to those used in Japan's popular Gogoro network.

Battery-swapping company Gogoro unveiled its GoStations in Taiwan in 2015, and now there are hundreds of them spread over the whole nation.

Gogoro's wide network in Taiwan facilitates over 350,000 battery swaps daily, for a grand total of over 350 million since the company started doing business.

Its stations are built to keep running even in the face of widespread blackouts. They can even feed the energy they have stored in their batteries back into the grid to power institutions like hospitals that are essential to the community.

Gogoro's battery-swapping network was initially only available in Taiwan, but the company has now expanded throughout Asia and into its first Western market, Israel, where users can purchase electric scooters and sign up for the service.

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Written by Trisha Kae Andrada