CAN BLOCKCHAIN KEEP EVS GREENER?
Polestar has just upped the blockchain bona fides of its latest release, the simply-named “2.” Like Ford, BMW and Mercedes-benz, the Swedish-chinese company is looking to root out all unethical practice from its manufacturing. It's taking a particularly keen look at the cobalt in its cars' batteries because, well, even by the most generous estimations, about 20 per cent of the precious metal mined in the Congo — which boasts some 60 to 70 per cent of the Earth's cobalt resources — is the product of child labour.
Now, it doesn't matter if you like EVS or not. It doesn't even matter if you think climate change is real or not. Having eight-yearold children root around in the dirt just so we Firstworld-ers can drive battery-powered luxury cars is just not on. So, congratulations to Polestar and all the other brands tracking how, where and by whom cobalt is being mined.
As part of its latest efforts, though, Polestar is now also tracking mica. Why mica? Well, as it turns out — and you'd know this if you, unlike me, spent any time reading fashion or makeup blogs — mica is likewise tied to some pretty unscrupulous child exploitation. This time it's India, and the kids are as young as five. Long-term exposure to the stuff — especially in what the Ethical Elephant says are “illegal mines” in the states of Jharkhand and Bihar — can lead to silicosis, tuberculosis, and asthma.
Again, it doesn't matter whether you love or hate EVS, care about the environment, or even drive a car of any kind for that matter, five-year-olds getting heatstroke from manual labour is something that desperately needs to be banned.
And blockchain, the decentralized digital “mining” technology we all know — but don't understand — makes all this tracking possible. I may not understand the mechanics of a “node consensus” or what “one-way hash cryptography” might entail, but it's easy to understand the benefits of being able to record any information both “chronologically” and “permanently.” In other words, as we've (poorly) had explained to us before with Bitcoin, once you've put in the data — again, the when, where and by whom of your cobalt or mica mining — there's no way some nefarious no-goodnik can cook the books.
And indeed, virtually all companies looking to reduce their global footprint are looking closely at how they source other metals like lithium, nickel and others in their quest for net-zero emissions. Along with mica and cobalt, Volvo digitally tracks all the carbon dioxide it emits during car production, claiming, for instance, that the huge aluminum casing that houses its main battery can now be produced with 750 fewer kilograms of CO2E thanks to suppliers only using renewable energy.
Such monitoring of manufacturing supply chains then is crucial if the electric revolution is to fulfil its carbon-reduction promise. Owners can even trace all aspects of their car's production thanks to Polestar's Product Sustainability Declaration, which discloses carbon footprint and “risk materials” through the company's website and in Polestar Spaces online. “This unprecedented level of traceability means that Polestar can promote sustainable and ethical practices in its supply chain, and provide better transparency for consumers,” says Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath, and promises that “blockchain tracking will eventually cover all risk minerals.”
Now that all sounds swell and mining ethically is not much of a problem when electric vehicles are but a niche. But what happens when (if?) said EV revolution really does match the speed promised by politicians?
It's a question that, if Steve Levine is right, we might be asking sooner rather than later. According to The Electric's “Just How Many EVS Can Be Made? Far Fewer than Expected,” there's only enough of the metals currently available to produce EVS for about half of the electric-car batteries we'll need.
Of course, as many will point out, other battery chemistries such as lithium-iron-phosphate will mitigate — but not eliminate — some of those constraints. So, too, will building smaller batteries. Optimists will, of course, point to recycling as a source of scarce materials, and say that alternatives such as sulphur and sodium may prove a panacea.
That does not alter, however, the likelihood that there will be near- and medium-term supply-chain issues tougher even that those we are experiencing today.
As I have said before, the battle of the future will not be climate-activist-versus-denier but rather automaker-versus-automaker in a desperate race to secure resources. Will the ethical mining so trumpeted today survive the transition?