Damodar Dahal
Model 3: 15 Kilograms of Clean and Green Child Slavery
Sat 29 July 2023Do you own a Tesla Model X? or Model 3? Are you planning to buy one? Then you must read this article. I want to show you how each Tesla car uses 15 kg of clean and green child slavery.
Metal resources are unequally distributed on the Earth’s crust. In 2022, 68% of the global cobalt supply came from the “diamond-of-creation” Congo. Since Cobalt is essential for lithium batteries, every electric car company amasses Congolese Cobalt. The country has a long history of slavery and exploitation. Just like the Congolese rubber in the 19th century made Belgium the wealthy country it is today, the Congolese Cobalt has also made Mr. Elon Musk the wealthiest man he is today. However, despite sitting atop 24 trillion dollars of natural resources, Congo is one of the poorest countries, with 62% of the population living below the poverty line. Despite the centuries of gap between Leopold II and Musk, hardly anything has changed in the lives of the Congolese people. This is because they have been systematically struggling to gain real independence (from neocolonialism, above all else), like many other African countries in today’s times.
The clean and green bullshit
Since every Tesla car needs around 15 kg of Cobalt for its lithium-based batteries, Tesla and other car companies create a massive demand for heterogenite (the Cobalt ore). When the “artisanal” miners — which includes 40,000 underfed children and 200,000+ uneducated and impoverished women and men of Congo — see a surge in Cobalt price, they start digging for the blue gold in primitive mines, much of it illegally because their government wouldn’t “support” it. The Cobalt mining factories — especially Swiss Glencore and Chinese Huayou Cobalt — silently buy from these artisanal miners, making north of 30% of their entire mining volume. However, it seems like the Cobalt apparently becomes clean and green after it undergoes refinery, enabling Tesla and other tech companies to buy from them without a grain of concern.
This excerpt is from Tesla’s Impact Report, 2022 (page 145):
“Tesla joined the CTPAT program in July 2019.… CTPAT members are required to have a documented social compliance program in place that, at a minimum, addresses how the company ensures goods imported into the United States were not mined, produced, or manufactured, wholly or in part, with prohibited forms of labor, i.e., forced, imprisoned, indentured or indentured child labor,” Tesla
This is the kind of bullshit language Tesla uses to avoid accountability. The well-documented modern slavery in the Congo invalidates their policy. There was even a House hearing on it. We already know that the Cobalt used in Tesla was mined under repression, including child labor, forced labor, hazardous working conditions, toxic air containing Sulphur, ground containing Uranium, etc. But how are they avoiding accountability? Hiding evidence in plain sight, companies like Tesla, Apple, Google, Dell, and Microsoft have even won lawsuits.
Remember that there are established checkpoints for systematic exploitations–planned underdevelopment, heavy taxes, private militias, the Congolese army, or the blind eyes of the numerous depots run primarily by Chinese traders–and a dictatorial government ruling atop an impoverished country paves the way for exploitation, nothing less of the 1984 sorts.
My Demands
I have nothing to vouch for fossil fuels. I wish to hold companies like Tesla and billionaires accountable for their atrocities. I want billionaires like Elon Musk to acknowledge the role of enslaved people in making their insurmountable wealth. Tesla is on its path to Big Green Cars, just like the Big Oil we have today. We need to hold it responsible and decry for its sins before it climbs that height.
I have four demands to make from Tesla.
Tesla should publicly apologize to the people of Congo for its involvement in systematically exploiting the Congolese people, specifically in looting the future of the children who are obliged to work in Cobalt mines rather than go to schools.
Rather than maintaining a baseless/absurd standard, Tesla should acknowledge the role of child labor, forced labor, and modern slavery in making its cars; and let consumers know truthfully about the situation while clarifying how they will eliminate this atrocity. Every Tesla pamphlet and ad needs to acknowledge this.
Tesla should install solar grids to allow Congolese people to reap some of the technologies they help to make. Rather than short-term profit, it should adopt a business model that involves the social development of its core labor force, which will inevitably aid in making Tesla the king of green car manufacturers.
Tesla should allow independent auditors to understand the involvement of child slavery. The company should make all data from such audits publicly available.
Tesla may still appear cleaner than fossil fuels, but not for the 60+ million Congolese cursed with tremendous wealth intrinsically connected with colonialism and slavery across centuries, including the 21st. But I hope that you, as a current or a future Tesla owner, are aware of the exploitation happening in the Cobalt supply chain right under the thin layer of corporate shinery. I hope you will not forget the hard labor and the sacrifices of the Congolese children who make Teslas. Drive responsibly, thinking about them.
Originally published on Substack at https://penguing.substack.com/p/model-3-15-kilograms-of-clean-and.