Hacker News Reader

Next you're going to tell me that the cobalt used to make batteries for the electric vehicles literally saving the environment right now in the West is being mined by enslaved children in the Congo with archaic hand tools and no PPE under inconceivable conditions.

View on HN

No, I'd tell you that the cobalt for electric cars is only a tiny fraction of the total cobalt used, and that combustion engines also need a lot, AND that there's less un-ethical sources of cobalt that many manufacturers use.

But that's the nitpicker in me. The general point that our over-consumption drives like 80% of the bad things in the world still stands. The only real solution is to consume less.

BYD and CATL are using cobalt-free chemistry in most of their batteries. I suppose that makes the Chinese evil for stealing the bread from Congolese children's mouths.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_iron_phosphate_battery

Reply on news.ycombinator.com