Cobalt Red

This is one of the most depressing books I've read in a long time, which makes it all the more pressing to internalize the stories here and translate them into action. With extensive field research combined with powerful prose, Kara has penned a damning work on the cobalt mining industry. The exploitative practices, horrendous conditions, and immense suffering spawned from the extraction of an element that fuels global battery production are laid out in devastating detail. It's impossible not to be deeply moved by these stories.

Kara also puts these practices into historical context, reviewing the repression and horror of Belgium's King Leopold's rule and subsequent colonial regimes. The lack of state and corporate accountability in the modern day, which Kara is able to reveal with simple in person trips to different mining areas in the Democratic Republic of Congo, reaches truly stunning heights. I only wish the book was longer so Kara could have examined that end of the supply chain in more detail. Highly recommend

First up, it has to be said that this book is breathtakingly brutal. The descriptions of the conditions under which Congolese artisanal miners work, and the injuries they suffer, are heartrending. The author has obviously shown great persistence, bravery, and empathy in investigating in the field. He counterposes statements from major electronics and EV manufacturers against the claim that there is no such thing as 'clean' cobalt, because artisanal (i.e., hand-mined) cobalt is merged into the supply chain so early that it can't be distinguished from mechanically-mined cobalt. That said, I'd have liked to see more explanation of just how the supposed certification processes function and how they fail so badly. That would also likely alleviate my other criticism which is that focusing on his observations in the field, involving Congolese security guards and officials together with Chinese dealers, runs the risk of occluding the role of Western companies in this dismal supply chain.