Despite the decimation of their consumer electronics businesses at the hands of Apple and Samsung, the major Japanese conglomerates remain stubbornly attached to their battery businesses.

It’s a tough call. The Koreans are driving commodification of the battery business and despite VC being funneled into developing next generation battery technology that could improve energy density, few technologies have much edge on lithium ion.

To that end, Sony announced today that would form a joint venture with Canadian utility Hydro-Quebec to research and develop energy storage systems. The intermittency of renewable energy sources like wind and solar are setting up grid problems where energy storage will be a new requirement so that energy can be provided in the evening. In December Hitachi announced that it was developing its own energy storage system for the North American market.

In a post-Fukushima world, the Japanese are also highly aware of issues related to energy storage and grid reliability. While few households are interested in storing energy at the residential level in the U.S., battery storage units in the home are relatively more common in Japan. The country is also becoming a leading market for solar and will have its own grid storage requirements.

It will be very competitive out there as many energy storage developers will source batteries from Korean electronics makers like LG Chem. But if the likes of Sony and Hitachi can distinguish themselves with well engineered grid storage systems and high quality lithium ion battery systems, they may just have a chance.