NZ’s Mainstream media slavishly supported the policies of the last Labour government promoting the use of electric vehicles (EV). However, they never addressed EV issues and problems such as child labour being used to mine resources; explosions overseas, and the energy needed to charge them. Waikanae’s Dougal Cable sent a letter to the editor about some of the difficulties of EVs and the indifference of the Greens to the problems.

This article sets out Dougal’s main points and other matters linked to the environmental impact of the resource extraction, manufacture, charging, and disposal of these vehicles.

By Dougal Cable and Roger Childs

The fraud of electric vehicles

Dougal’s letter was published by The Post (a Stuff paper) on Wednesday 29 February 2024.  In it he observed:- “As Climate Change Commission chair Rod Carr pointed out, about 25,000 child labourers mine cobalt in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Many of these die when the rabbit-burrows-like tunnels collapse, crushing or suffocating them.”

There has never been a squeak from the Green Party about this horrific problem linked to obtaining raw materials for EVs. Nor has it drawn attention to the overall environmental damage associated with EV production.

As it happened, it was ACT Party MP Simon Court who raised the issues associated with EV problems at the recent Parliamentary Environment Select Committee. 

We firmly believe that EVs are a fraud. There is the gradually diminishing range of the batteries, the massive cost of replacing them (almost always exceeding the residual cost of the vehicle), and the fact that lithium batteries do not function well in low temperatures, as Dougal’s sister in the US pointed out after thousands of EVs were stranded when the last polar blast hit the northern states.

 In addition, EV owners protesting about the imminent introduction of Road User Charges, overlook that their vehicles are exponentially heavier than a conventionally powered car of the same size, and have a greater impact on road surfaces.

There are also the problems of EVs occasionally catching fire and the disposal of lithium batteries. Mining lithium in the first place involves massive earth-moving machines tearing up thousands of acres of land to access the ore, then loading the ore into equally massive dump trucks all of them belching many thousands of cubic litres of diesel exhaust. Add to  that the energy required to power the machines that crush and extract the ore and refine it.

The Climatist Alarmists’ obsession with fossil fuel use

When EV cars and other vehicles were first manufactured they were hailed as the future for road transport because they did no+t use petrol or gas. However, all the other costs and problems mentioned above were not considered. A lithium battery for an EV is not only very heavy, it requires more than 13 kg of cobalt which children extract in appalling and dangerous conditions in the DRC.

EV’s also take a long time to charge and use plenty of electricity. Moreover millions of dollars have been spent setting up charging stations around the country.

As Ian Bradford ironically puts it —  If you don’t mind the high price; don’t need to drive very far or very often; have a reliable, independent recharging source; never need to drive in very cold weather and don’t care about the environment and human rights, then buy an electric vehicle. 

The way ahead

It is interesting that major car companies are now rethinking building EVs as they have become too expensive. (See several previous WW articles.) Coal-fired powered stations once created massive amounts of pollution but new technology has made them much less of an environmental problem. The focus of the vehicle industry in the future is likely to be on greater fossil fuel efficiencies. 

Now that The Post has printed Dougal’s letter, the paper will hopefully get some of their journalists to objectively examine both sides of the EV story in detail.