By Vijay Jayaraj
The silent, gleaming chassis of an electric vehicle (EV) glides through a pristine forest or a spotless, futuristic city. The message is simple: The driver is saving the planet. It is a narrative built on a convenient, calculated omission.
Pull back the curtain on the EV supply chain – starting with Indonesian nickel mining and extending through rare-earth mineral processing in China – and there is revealed a far less immaculate picture. The “zero tailpipe emissions” tag is a masterpiece of misdirection, diverting attention away from an environmental hellscape.
In Sulawesi, Indonesia, conveyor belts stretch across once-lush forests belching dust into the air, while smokestacks stain the sky with a toxic haze. The rush to supply the West’s EV appetite has triggered a nickel boom, but the cost lands squarely on the people and ecosystems of Indonesia.
So, why single out nickel? Today’s batteries – the heart of EV propulsion – are built on nickel, of which Indonesia is the largest producer. Without Indonesian nickel, the supply chains for “clean” vehicles grind to a halt. And every new electric SUV delivered to showrooms leaves behind the environmental cost imposed on these Indonesian communities.
What exactly billows from Indonesian smokestacks and seeps from factory discharges into rivers and soils? A partial list includes sulfur dioxide, a corrosive gas; nitrogen oxides and microscopic particulate matter, both constituents of smog; chromium; ammonia; hydrogen sulfide; and heavy metals such as lead, arsenic, cobalt and cadmium. All are pollutants with potential effects on health.
Fishers from Sulawesi and North Maluku lament vanishing shoals and toxic mud spilling into the sea. Even the air is said to taste of metal and ash. These are the lived experiences of thousands of Indonesians, not isolated anecdotes.
The battery is only part of the story. The EV’s electric motor, as well as the machinery of giant wind turbines that might charge the battery, require powerful magnets made from rare-earth minerals. And more than 90% of the world’s supply of these processed minerals comes from China.
The processing of these minerals has left in its wake an ecological ruin that is glossed over in Western policy debates.
Cities like Baotou in Inner Mongolia are infamous for dystopian toxic lakes, which are artificial ponds filled with black sludge contaminated by thorium, uranium and hazardous chemicals. Acidic wastewater, the byproduct of mineral extraction and processing, leaks into the environment, poisoning farmland and waterways.
Toxic runoff has polluted Southeast Asian rivers such as the Malihka and N’Mai Hka, which are headwaters of the great Irrawaddy and Mekong rivers. Water supplies for millions of people in Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam have been tainted.
Sadly, “green” enthusiasts are not interested in real pollution but rather in the demonization of carbon dioxide (CO2). The alarmist movement requires an invisible, ubiquitous bogeyman to panic people in relinquishing their money and sovereignty.
The entire “net-zero” edifice is built on the claim that CO₂ is a pollutant that is causing a climate crisis. This is the greatest deception of our time. Many countries do not regulate CO₂ for the protection of public health, as common sense and good science would dictate. After all, CO2 is a gas of life, sustaining plants and every animal that depends on them for food. Each of us exhales two pounds of CO2 daily.
The mass evangelism for EVs and wind turbines is not a noble crusade to save the planet. It is a cynical ploy to enrich a small cadre of green-tech investors and empower global bureaucrats.
The intent here is not to halt the use of nickel or rare earths, both of which serve many useful purposes. The point is, the “green” agenda is not green. It is a dark marketing campaign for a self-serving ideology willing to sacrifice whole regions to its toxic byproducts.
This commentary was first published by PJ Media on November 25, 2025.
Vijay Jayaraj is a Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Fairfax, Virginia. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India.
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Just like rooftop solar, EVs are a direct transfer of wealth (via taxation and subsidies) from poor people who cannot afford it to rich people who can. I mean, wind farms and solar farms are also transferring wealth, but that’s crony corruption,. Rooftop solar & EVs are direct from poor to rich, mandated by your own government. In-your-face direct in most cases. Smug sons of bachelors!
Solar does three things: it’s a filthy industrial process converting raw silica into ultra-pure polysilicon required for PV’s so 1) environmental degradation. Its unreliable, intermittent, low energy density and material intensive so 2) needless electrical cost escalation. Because of the way the minerals are bound together it will never be cost effectively recycled so 3) $ muti-100’s of billions in landfill costs for toxic disposal.
Truly, solar is worth less than nothing. It’s no longer a farce, it’s outright fraud. The only thing “fertile” about solar is the “fertile” STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) deficient low information voters who fall for the climate alarmist industrial complex propaganda. An international tragedy.
As I recall, all EV’s have at least 4 tires. Some have spares, some do not to reduce weight.
As I recall, tires are made from synthetic rubber. Synthetic rubber is made from coal products such as styrene and butadiene.
Therefore, all EV’s are coal cars.
A short series of internet searches doesn’t come up with a verification of your assertion that tires are made from coal products. Carbon black made from petroleum and natural gas is a large constituent in the production of the rubber for tires. As they say in New York, you can look it up.
Steve, I’ll call the nit you picked, and raise you.
You can look it up.
You could look this up too –
Maybe doorman could have replaced “coal” with “fossil fuels” for those of limited intellectual capacity, do you think?
No offense intended.<g>
Thanks, my favorite is SASOL ==> Wikipedia article on commercial syn fuels.
Why not just ask an engineer who in involved in the process? Or read a chemical engineering publication on the topic?
The activists never bother to look at Tier 3 emissions for products that requires thinking and when you are saving the planet between your lattes and virtue signalling you don’t get time for that.
A well written diatribe if ever there was one. Electric cars are here to stay and everyone here at WUWT should get used to that fact. We have a hybrid Ford Escape. The old Escape got ~20 mpg. The hybrid Escape gets gets 40 mpg. We probably wouldn’t own one if the price tag was a true reflection of the actual cost.
Steve, your “hybrid” vehicle is not exactly an “electric car”, is it? You say it gets 40 mpg, and as far as I know, gallon is a liquid fuel measure. Liquid fossil fuel measure, probably.
Electric cars are excellent for niche use, Not suitable for my purpose. Even diesel doesn’t suit, with diesel exhaust fluid needed, DPF burn off requirements, and so on.
Just petrol (gasoline), 91 RON, and I’m happy.
Your “hybrid” vehicle obviously suits you. All, or at least the majority, of the electricity it uses comes from – fossil fuels. Even wind and solar cannot exist without – fossil fuels.
Taking into account that fossil fuels are just stored sunlight, I can’t see why anybody would want to return to the Stone Age, but some obviously do.
How true. These niche vehicles are a luxury item and impractical for the majority of people.
One good indicator of that is the line one must stand in at the local Pick-and-Pull, where many who can’t afford virtue signalling turn to keep their ICE vehicles going.
Yup.
Vehicles are just tools for doing transportation work.
We choose the most appropriate tool for the job at hand.
I have 1800 W of solar on my 5th wheel, with 660 Ahr of battery. For remote sites, solar works great. However, I tow it with a 7.3L gas powered 4 door long bed truck, which provides 480 VA of additional charging capacity.
So … is the combination a “hybrid”?
You put the single word hybrid in quotes, which usually denotes you mean the colloquial meaning of the term- what most people think of when they think of one. Most people start at Toyota Prius then allow for different shapes and sizes. 5th wheel seems several steps from a Prius to me.
I hear those Ford Escape vehicles are very good cars.
Hybrids might be here to stay. They make sense as long as you don’t have to charge them up.
All-electric cars are another story. They won’t be here to stay until the gasoline runs out, imo.
A plug-in hybrid ours isn’t. If it were, a trip to the gas station would be a rare event. Yes it’s a very good car but the computer CRAP is outrageous. It Beeps at you when you park your car. It screams at you if you stop to fast. It shakes the wheel if you change your lane. And the eighteen buttons on the wheel are insane.
Hmmm there was a Bob Dylan tune that went like that. My short search didn’t find it. He was prolific (-: He’s 86 & still with us.
Rainy Day Women #12 & 35″ ==> You Tube
They’ll stone you when you’re riding in your car
They’ll stone you when you’re playing your guitar
The problem with hybrids, most have not realized yet, is once their big motive battery dies, the entire car becomes a boat anchor. the computer will not allow the engine to start if there is a fault with the hybrid battery! And at that point in their life cycle, the cost of replacing this motive battery is more than the value of the car, so even though the engine, transmission, chassis etc are still very roadworthy, it is assigned to the scrap heap. Beware, and do not try to keep the hybrid for too long!
I think you missed the point. It was not a diatribe against electric cars; it is an expose on the scam of presenting them as “clean and pristine” and the false promotion of them on a political scale, forcing others to subsidize the avarice and narcissism of a few.
That fraud is hopefully not here to stay.
Correct. The post is about the never ending praise for how clean we are told EVs are, and that they actually are not that clean. It’s not about whether EVs are here to stay, as you point out. Thx for refocusing the discussion.
BTW. I’d consider a hybrid if Toyota would put it in a Tundra. I just don’t about how hybrids compare on torque, or potential repair costs as they age. I would think the electric motor part of the hybrid would have more torque at the axle but I don’t know.
Nobody is demanding that EV’s be outlawed What we are demanding is that the subsidies and mandates go away.
Yes, there will always be airheads who put virtue signaling above practicality. However, as long as they are only wasting their own money, nobody cares.
They won’t be here to stay once the price tag truly reflects the actual cost.
I agree, but I also remember:
“1998: The first major consumer flat-screen TV, a 42-inch Philips model, was released. It was priced at $15,000, which is about $27,000 in today’s money.”
Cars are much different. You need economies of scale to sell cars at affordable prices. Easy to achieve with electronics that everybody wants, difficult to achieve with cars nobody wants save a few virtue signaling well-to-dos.
Economies of scale will dry up quick without government mandates and subsidies, and the continued lack of sufficient grid power to charge them just puts another nail in their coffin.
“We probably wouldn’t own one if the price tag was a true reflection of the actual cost.”
While they are here to stay and have been for decades, your honest statement is why they will never become main stream. That and chargers, batteries, tires, road wear taxes, etc.
Hybrid was the obvious choice but the company that did it first and best was not American, so
To clarify: MILD hybrid is the obvious choice. “Plug-in” hybrids suck, because they put too little engine in them and you’re back to dependence on the battery (and the intolerable recharge times), unless you relish reliving the experience of driving a 1974 Ford Pinto (aka “underpowered piece of shit that can’t get out of its own way “).
One of the common features of so called Green ideology is its capacity to ignore that which it does not want to see or talk about.
The Greens want ever more wind turbines needed to save the planet while happily ignoring the damage they do to birds and habitat in which they are erected.
The Greens want ever more solar arrays carpeting our farm land destroying much needed wildlife habitat in the countryside the fact the solar arrays are productive for less than 20% of installed potential is ignored also.
The Greens want ever more EVs while happily ignoring the pollution and processes needed to produce the technology involved.
The Greens want organic food production conveniently ignoring the fact we have 8 billion mouths to feed on planet earth which are being maintained by modern farming methods and equipment powered by fossil fuel.
The Greens wan to to see world population decline to below 1 billion to save the planet, they are not volunteering to be the first to leave, I suspect many think they would be part of the one billion who remain….
The Greens are long on talk and short on personal example. The John Kerry, and Al Gore brigade of influencers happily ignore their own private jet habits, because they are doing important work, saving the planet….apparently.
It would be helpful if the Greens adopted a more descriptive name for themselves, i.e., hypocrites,
Spotlight 7 documentary on Indonesian nickel:
Great Documentary! Thanks.
“So, why single out nickel? Today’s batteries – the heart of EV propulsion – are built on nickel, of which Indonesia is the largest producer. Without Indonesian nickel, the supply chains for “clean” vehicles grind to a halt. And every new electric SUV delivered to showrooms leaves behind the environmental cost imposed on these Indonesian communities.”
The latest battery technology doesn’t use nickel, cobalt and rare earth metals.
They are known as Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) batteries. They use iron and phosphate in the cathode instead of nickel and cobalt. They have a good safety profile and a lower cost.
The following site describes the improvements of the latest LFP technology which is used in the Chinese-manufactured BYD electric cars.
https://batteryswapstation.com/what-is-byd-blade-battery/
Here are some major points in the article:
Breakthrough Energy Density: Simplified structure and better space utilization significantly boost volumetric energy density. Blade Batteries reach 439-450 Wh/L, far surpassing traditional LFP packs (120-230 Wh/L), and rivaling some nickel-rich ternary lithium batteries (e.g., NCM523 at 250-380 Wh/L), overcoming the conventional bulkiness of LFP batteries.
Amid high raw material costs, the blade battery’s simplified structure reduces secondary components by 40%. Combined with LFP’s inherently lower material cost compared to ternary lithium, this results in 20-30% lower pack costs.
However there are some disadvantages that are being addressed, such as lower performance in cold climates, and greater complexity of repair.
So they come with a Bluetti as backup?
🤓
LFP
Lower energy density.
Similar supply chains as other LI-ion chemistries.
Note: I am using Li-ion in the common language derived definition of rechargeable (secondary) chemistries employing Lithium in the cell.
Thermal runaway: 120 C
Flammable organics? Yes.
They have their place in the spectrum of electro chemical energy sources, but they are not the panacea one might conclude from your post.
No cobalt or magnesium is a plus.
No nickel is a plus.
It is a technology worth keeping an eye on, especially the Blade configuration.
The disadvantages that you glossed over are not as insignificant as your write up presents.
Interested parties should visit the byd blade to get better clarification.
Another negative in the current political environment, it is Chinese.
Second opinion to confirm all that SN wrote will pass investigation.
It seems like every few months some new battery tech is announced, but the energy density issue always gets hidden
(plus) For utility scale energy, conversion loss issue gets hiden. IF the system for battery storage is only 50% efficient, THEN the cost of what comes out of the battery has twice the unit cost of whatever went in.
LiFePO batteries use twice the copper per watt of power storage when compared to LiCO lithium batteries. Let’s look at third world copper production and pollution, shall we? (P.S. there is no free lunch)
JP illustrates why this site is worth reading – There are people here (engineers and others) who know WTF they’re talking about.
There’s another battery technology that sounds promising (as in teetering on the edge of “too good to be true”), I forget the new chemistry.
But since it hasn’t already displaced lithium ion batteries, color me skeptical.
Ah, here it is:
“Tesla’s new Super Aluminum-Ion Battery is a significant advancement that could potentially replace solid-state batteries. This technology utilizes aluminum and graphene, which are more abundant and cheaper than…”
COULD POTENTIALLY.
Double weasel word alert!
Lithium Ion chemistries, both primary (one time use) and secondary (rechargeable) are not solid-state batteries. The electrolyte is organic and not solid..
as a former head of the UNIPCC stated – the real goal of the environmental movement is the destruction of capitalism – so all the negatives around the green movement will not persuade the faithful
Sudbury, Ontario, Canada was (is?) a great nickel producer. Fifty years ago, the area downwind of Sudbury was in sad shape. Don’t know what it looks like now.
Ford does not break out losses by individual EV model like the Mustang Mach-E, but its Model e division (which includes the Mach-E) has reported significant per-vehicle losses:
“In Hebrew tradition, a male goat was chosen for a sin offering, and in the specific ritual for Yom Kippur, two goats were used: one was sacrificed as a sin offering, while the other, the scapegoat, was symbolically burdened with the sins of the community and sent into the wilderness.”
But, that is the whole and only point of the scam!
Somewhere else
Cobalt Red
How the Blood of the Congo Powers our Lives
Author: Siddharth Kara
As young as 4 years old …
The PEV is a transitory niche vehicle for quite a number of obvious reasons. #1 is the mineral demand (Michaux,GTK Open File Work Report 42/2021):10,000X increase in mining of lithium, 2,000X increase in cobalt, 4,000X the graphite, 7,000X the vanadium, 29,000 the germanium, and 1000X increase for silver: all required for batteries. #2 is the virtue signal with which they have been infused. By now, only the willfully ignorant (WI) have not understood the facts. Sadly, there are many WI’s running around doing precisely as they are told.
“Without Indonesian nickel, the supply chains for “clean” vehicles grind to a halt.”
Statement fails Google check.
First result landed me on a pie chart – yes Indonesia is the top producing country but the first chart I see has 4 countries at about 20 percent each then the final 20 percent divided amongst others.
It is a bad thing, all to satisfy mindless eco freaks and thoughtless bureaucrats. What a pitiful waste.
Indonesia’s nickel refining efforts are only a small part of south Asia’s ignoring of environmental protection advocated by the climate alarmists. From India eastward to Indonesia and north to China there has been the largest increase in coal consumption and the resulting emissions on the planet. Yet there are still suckers particularly in North America and Europe who believe their EV purchases are striking a major blow against the non-existent climate crisis.
Worse: They still believe a whole series of whopping lies that provide the “backstory” for their supposed “need” to “save the planet.”
A short list – they believe the following lies:
I am still waiting for the definition of the optimum climate, which needs measurable metrics that can be tested by anyone.
For all we know we are approaching the optimum, not headed for disaster.
Note: I am not in favor of a single global climate definition, but it is a good start. There are many climate types and many climate regions and averaging the averages to get a precision value without an error band of any kind is, frankly, what was backing up in the COP30 toilets.
Computer models can do extrapolations and possibly reasonable projections (if done right). A hind casting is simply curve fitting and a curve fitted model has not future prediction or projection value. It can only do extrapolations.
What is it about life 50 million years in the future that this climate fanatics hate? I burn fossil fuels to return CO2 that was extracted from the atmosphere by biological processes and sequestered away by geological processes, thereby making it possible for plants to grow in the distant future.Make no mistake, the processes that sequester atmospheric CO2 will eventually cause the biosphere to die.
EV subsides are unethical and immoral as they are “financially supporting and encouraging” countries like China and Africa that supply the lithium and cobalt for those EV batteries, that lack sufficient labor laws and environmental regulations, to continue humanity atrocities against their people with yellow, brown, and black skin, and environmental degradation in those developing countries, for the exotic minerals and metals to make EV batteries, JUST so the wealthy countries could go “green”!