. Sigh! But whatabout the communities being lost from Lithium mining or the chidren that work down Lithium mines In Asian countries e…., just so are kides and granchildren can breath clean air. Not as EV’s are green during manufacture as they have a higher footprint, which many on the scheme won’t cover enough miles to offset this!
Wot ya mean bruv? There is no loss of communities, but communities are created, mining comunities are the strongest ones, england had lots of strong coal mining communities. What about the kides working down mines, you got any names i can check? An dem ev vehilcles are replaceing nasty oily sooty desels knocking the socks of stinky diesels for the evironment like 2 birds wi one stone. Whats dem mines you on about so i can check?
Ski mask it’s well documented however it does require a certain amount of awareness and the ability to read and understand there is plenty of information out there for you to find I wish you well in your journey of understanding and empathy good luck
There is a darkside to mining Rare Earth Elements, which you choose to ignore and liken to communities of European coal mines!
An electric car requires six times the mineral inputs of a conventional car, and a wind plant requires nine times more minerals than a gas-fired plant. With current estimates, demand for REEs could increase six-fold by 2040. Lithium and cobalt demand could increase ten to twenty times by 2050 because of electric cars. Demand for dysprosium and neodymium is estimated to increase seven to twenty-six times over the next 25 years as a result of electric vehicles and wind turbines. But REEs also have grim prospects: the way companies extract REEs largely damages communities and contaminates surrounding areas.
Methods used to mine REE’s produce mountains of toxic waste, with high risk of environmental and health hazards. For every ton of rare earth produced, the mining process yields 13kg of dust, 9,600-12,000 cubic meters of waste gas, 75 cubic meters of wastewater, and one ton of radioactive residue. Rare earth element ores have metals that, when mixed with leaching pond chemicals, contaminate air, water, and soil. Even more worrying is that rare earth ores are often laced with radioactive thorium and uranium, which result in especially detrimental health effects. Overall, for every ton of rare earth, 2,000 tons of toxic waste are produced.
China dominates REE mining, mainly because of lax environmental regulations. Low cost, high pollution methods enabled China to outpace competitors and create a strong foothold in the international REE market. Processing plants in China and, more than two decades ago, in Malaysia itself, who’s plant lies in an industrial zone atop reclaimed swampland, just 12 miles from Kuantan, a city of 600,000 Mine workers and communities around these mines exposure to mineral deposits and radioactivity have been linked to an increased risk of developing lung, pancreatic, and other cancers.
Theese markets are now booming, China alone increased its outputs for the first half of 2021 alone by more than 27 percent, hitting record levels of REE extraction as demand increases.
China’s most infamous REE mine Bayan-Obo, the largest REE mine in the world. Even more infamous than the mine itself is the tailing pond it has produced: there are over 70,000 tons of radioactive thorium stored in the area. As a result, its contents have been seeping into groundwater and will eventually hit the Yellow River, a key source of drinking water. Currently, the sludge is moving at a pace of 20-30 meters per year, a dangerously rapid rate.
There are plenty more examples of unsafe mines throughout China. The village of Lingbeizhen in the Southern Jiangxi province has leaching ponds and wastewater pools exposed to open air. Txic chemicals spilling into groundwater or waterways since they are left unmonitored and vulnerable to all around. In another mine, so much wastewater was created that China had to build a treatment facility to clean 40,000 tons of wastewater per day before letting the water flow back into the river.
Workers along with communities are also suffering from health complications due to exposure to these toxic chemicals. Worker safety is not prioritized or monitored in these mines, resulting in skin irritation and disruptions to their respiratory, nervous, and cardiovascular systems. Human rights abuses have been reported throughout mines in these areas.
China has taken some steps to address issues arising from REE mining, but not nearly enough. China estimates US$5.5 billion in damage from caused by both official and illegal mining that needs to be cleaned.
The Chinese government has also acknowledged the existence of so-called “cancer villages” where a disproportionately large number of people have fallen ill with cancer due to mining-based pollution.
China officials have shut down some smaller illegal mining operations such as the mine north of the village of Lingbeizhen in southern Jiangxi. Officials are looking to consolidate mining under six state-owned groups that the Chinese government claims will maintain better practices surrounding toxic waste management, but farmers claim state-owned companies are just as bad. Some argue state-owned companies are worse because they poison communities with governmental support. For example, in Zhongshan, a company claimed it was extracting resources before the government built a highway in the area, but after the highway was finished, it refused to leave. People in the area began noticing wastewater seeping into their farms, and they were forced to inhale sulfur every time they went outside. Farmers from Yulin, an area with REE mining, have a similar story.
China understands the value of its monopoly and wants to maintain the status quo. It appears as though China is now moving its operations to Africa, where it can contaminate outside communities instead of exposing its citizens at home to the risks of REE mining. Though some of these operations are conducted by private companies, the six major mining companies are all state-owned enterprises. China has achieved exclusive rights to the REE deposits in a handful of African countries in return for infrastructure building. For example, China obtained the rights to lithium mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in return for building national roads, highways, and hospitals. Human rights issues are ripe in areas of REE ming in Democratic Republic of the Congo. Similarly, China obtained commercial licenses for REE mines in Kenya by agreeing to build a US$666 million data center. More deals are surfacing in Cameroon, Angola, Tanzania, and elsewhere, where there’s similar stories of Human rights abuse surrounding minining communities. Though African nations accept these deals now, some worry that this is a long-term strategy for China to lock African nations into a cycle of debt.
the United States has restarted some of its older REE mining operations in various states, in order to counter Chinese influence. The government wants to ensure that critical US industries can remain separate from China in the event of a larger dispute. Unfortunately the United States nor Europe have enough REE to cope with the ever increasing demand for electric vehicles and wind turbines ontop of the already demand for everyday items that use REE and more importantly to protect human rights.
This dirty secret will continue, so no I do not except your comment, that our children and grandchildren will breath more easily, when children in other parts of the world carry on suffering to suit western government whims or those that are gullable enouth to think electric cars are the clean machine of the future but, I guess ou can say, were allright Jack so sod whats out of sght out of mind!
I can understand and fully get those choosing an electric car for cheaper running running costs but, their proclaimed green credentials sorry I don’t agree with 🙂