Comment by petertodd

Yup. On a much bigger scale it's common for the power supplies going to electric trains to do this too. They like to use regenerative braking because it's efficient. But the electricity grid can't always handle the extra power, so in some designs they have a backup mechanism to dissipate the power if needed; diesel-electrics usually just have a big bank of air-cooled load resistors on the roof.

A neat example of regenerative braking being important is the London Underground: they've had a persistent problem with high temperatures in the subway, of which a decent % is actually heat from trains braking. By using regenerative braking rather than putting that energy into the tunnels as heat, they can transport that energy outside the tunnels, keeping them cooler.