SEOUL (Reuters) – Hyundai Motor Co. will replace battery systems in some 82,000 electric vehicles worldwide due to fire hazards, a problem that combined with an earlier recall costs around $ 900 million to the automaker.
Most of the latest recall relates to his best electric car, the Kona EV, which was first recalled in October for a software update after a series of fires.
But in January, one of the recalled vehicles caught fire and South Korean authorities launched an investigation into whether the initial recall was appropriate.
LG Energy Solution, a division of LG Chem Ltd that manufactures the batteries, said in a statement that Hyundai Motor has abused LG’s proposal for fast-charging logic in Hyundai’s battery management system and should not the battery cell would be seen as a direct cause for the fire hazard.
The new recall applies to around 76,000 Kona EVs as well as some Ioniq EV and Elec City models.
There have been some 15 fires with the Kona EV – 11 in South Korea, two in Canada and one each in Finland and Austria, according to the transport ministry.
Hyundai said in a statement that approximately 38.9 billion was earned as a result of the first recall of the 1 trillion earned in estimated recall costs.
Shares of Hyundai Motor and LG Chem traded down 3.7% and 1.9% respectively in afternoon trading compared to a 2% fall for the market as a whole.
(Won $ 1 = 1,111.7900)
Reciting with Heekyong Yang and Joyce Lee; Edited by Edwina Gibbs