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Recharge for Rights: Ranking the Human Rights Due Diligence Reporting of Leading Electric Vehicle Makers

cover of Recharge for Rights: Ranking the Human Rights Due Diligence Reporting of Leading Electric Vehicle Makers
(Colin Foo)

The climate emergency is a human rights crisis that requires an urgent, unified, global response. It threatens the enjoyment of civil, political, economic, social, and cultural rights of present and future generations and, ultimately, the future of humanity. The primary driver of climate change – fossil fuels – must be phased out as the world transitions to renewable energy.

As part of this transition, some countries have incentivized the switch from fossil fuel-powered vehicles to electric ones. If countries meet their stated targets, the switch to electric vehicles (EVs) could help cut global greenhouse gases. But the increasing demand for EVs creates new human rights challenges and threatens to deepen the well-documented human rights abuses rampant across the mining sector.

The electric vehicle batteries require cobalt, copper, lithium, nickel, and other minerals. The rush to increase the supply of these minerals has led to the rapid expansion of mines causing human rights abuses and environmental harm around the world.

In this report, Amnesty International has assessed 13 global brands. The report finds that most companies are not sufficiently demonstrating that they are meeting international human rights standards or even putting their policies into action. The slow, ad-hoc pace of due diligence improvements across the industry demonstrates the need for legislation to drive meaningful change.

Read “Recharge for Rights: Ranking the Human Rights Due Diligence Reporting of Leading Electric Vehicle Makers.”