Tesla, Batteries, and Human Rights Abuses

Because human rights are not important to Big Tech, not when they NEED those minerals to build your coal-powered cars. Tesla battery material supplier tops list of human rights abuses for second year in a row - The Verge

Tesla buys battery materials from the mining giant with the most allegations of human rights abuses against it in a database of abuses tied to clean energy. Mining company Glencore has racked up at least 70 allegations since 2010, including accusations of corruption and poor working conditions, according to the nonprofit Business & Human Rights Resource Centre.

Both Tesla and the abuser of human rights (or supplier of nickel and cobalt, whichever) say that they are taking steps to correct the issues. But if you can't fix those issues in 13 years, when do you think that they will?

And that isn't the only problem of course.

Corruption was a growing problem for Glencore and the rest of the industry last year, according to the report. There were four times as many corruption allegations against mining companies in 2022 compared to the year before. In one case, Glencore pleaded guilty to foreign bribery and market manipulation charges and agreed to pay $1.1 billion in fines. Glencore and its subsidiaries “bribed corrupt intermediaries and foreign officials in seven countries for over a decade” and “undermined public confidence by creating the false appearance of supply and demand to manipulate oil prices,” according to the US Department of Justice. In Zambia, Glencore faces another investigation by the country’s Anti-Corruption Commission into alleged payments the company made to a political party.

But if you want electric cars, you need to be okay with child labor in the Congo, and the environmental devastation from lithium mining in South America and nickel mining in Indonesia. And probably other things as well.

The article at The Verge is accompanied by a photo of a Terex RH340 excavator. It is almost on the scale of the old stripping shovels. The tracks are 2 meters high. The tracks are 9 meters long. The bucket, or the large version anyway, can hold 44.5 cubic yards. The engine is 2,520 horse power or 1,879 kilowatts.. It is clearly sitting on the floor of a strip mine. I always thought environmentalists hated strip mining. I guess that changes if they are mining stuff needed for electric cars. (So if they are mining coal to produce electricity to power those electric cars, is that strip mining OK?)

Do human rights matter to you? You might want to consider what went into your lithium-ion batteries.