Toyota has announced plans to build a futuristic smart city, fuelled by hydrogen fuel cells, at the base of Mount Fuji in Japan.

The Japanese automotive giant unveiled plans at the CES industry conference in Las Vegas.

The Woven City - a reference to Toyota’s history as a loom making company - will provide a test bed for technologies such as autonomous cars, artificial intelligence-powered infrastructure, smart homes and other forms of automation, according to Reuters.

The development, which will be built up over the next few years starting with construction this year on a 175 site, will house 2,000 residents and researchers to test out the technologies, according to Toyota Research Institute chief technology officer James Kuffner, who explained that residents could consist of Toyota employees, retirees and others.

The company has commissioned Bjarke Ingels, a Danish architect behind the 2 World Trade Center building in New York and the Google offices in London and Silicon Valley, to design the smart city.

Speaking at CES, Akio Toyoda, chief executive of Toyota, described the Woven City concept as his own “personal field of dreams”.

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