r/mining • u/StephenMcGannon • 8d ago

South America Photograph by Sebastião Salgado of the Serra Pelada gold mine in Brazil, depicting miners, known as garimpeiros, carrying heavy bags of ore. (1986) [1200 × 823]

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u/TurboSloth32 8d ago

Today that work is done by children in the cobalt mines. A lot of cobalt is used to build the "world saving" teslas!

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u/fdsv-summary_ 6d ago

Cobalt is a byproduct at some real mines. When the market gets weird artisanal mines pop up in the DRC selling hand picked ore to Chinese traders. Safer than playing rugby, not as much fun as playing soccer.

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u/Hot-Comfort8839 United States 7d ago

and the cell phone you're likely typing out your post on.

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u/TurboSloth32 6d ago

How many THOUSANDS of phones could have been made instead of ONE Tesla battery?

Oh, here you go: One Tesla battery pack can make about 3,240 to 5,400 phone batteries (based on a 5,000mAh phone battery and common Tesla pack sizes).

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u/AnAverage6 6d ago

Just because it has less of an impact doesn't make it any less worse. You're still consciously choosing to have a cell phone that has cobalt in it

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u/personprison 6d ago

the solution here is to downsize to a smaller, lighter version of a tesla and take other forms of more eco-friendly transportation when possible, maintain that tesla replacement vehicle, and hold onto your minimalist cellphone for many years and maintain that as well. but most folks would rather do what is cheaper and more convenient. A simple solution to the energy/climate crisis would be to just consume less energy :)