![]() Many EV brands have made public commitments to “responsible sourcing” of minerals, and some – notably Tesla – are using innovative ways to achieve this. While the cobalt supply chain is highly complex, all these car manufacturers identified by the Guardian can be linked to one or more of the industrial mines named by the Guardian through a small number of key refineries and battery makers. It’s a shocking situation, but I can’t leave the job because there is no other choice. The Guardian has tracked the cobalt supply chain from TFM and other industrial mines through a number of refiners and battery makers to some of the world’s leading electric car manufacturers, including Tesla, VW, Volvo, Renault and Mercedes-Benz. In a number of mines run by Chinese companies, workers made allegations of discrimination and racism reminiscent of the colonial era. He is employed, via a subcontractor, at Tenke Fungurume mine (TFM), one of the country’s biggest industrial mines, which is 80% owned by the Chinese company China Molybdenum(CMOC).Īn investigation by the Guardian has found that some workers, often employed through subcontractors, allege they are victims of severe exploitation, including wages as low as 30p an hour, precarious employment with no contracts, and paltry food rations. Pierre is not working at an artisanal mine, however. ‘At lunch I’m given two bread rolls,’ claims a miner working at an industrial mine in the DRC. Some companies in the cobalt supply chain have promised to stop sourcing from artisanal mines and instead get the mineral from large-scale industrial mines, which are seen as a safer option both for workers and corporate reputations. Stories of the harsh and dangerous working conditions endured by miners in the DRC’s informal, or artisanal, cobalt mines – of child labour and miners being buried alive as tunnels cave in – have provoked an international outcry in recent years, forcing the western technology and automotive brands that rely on the mineral to look for ways to source “clean” cobalt, free from human rights abuses. “The relationship between us and the is like a slave and a master,” says Pierre. If you do, you’ll be fired,” he says, squatting on the dirt floor of the bare brick shack he rents. If he is sick and misses more than two days in a month, more money is cut. If he takes a day off, he says money is deducted from his wages. It gives me a headache … The mine makes so much and we make so little,” he says. Not that lunch is worth waiting for: he claims he is given just two small bread rolls and a carton of juice. Although CobaltSS.Net assures that certain tuners know what they're doing something, many will eventually break.He says his basic wage is the equivalent of £2.60 ($3.50) a day, but if he works through lunch and puts in hours of overtime, he can make up to about £3.70. With such tuning potential obviously comes great peril, which is why it is best to avoid buying these heavily tuned cars. The dyno results page showcases modest tunes producing 300 HP and full nitrous builds going as high as 898 HP -a truly crazy figure in the 3,000 lbs car. With different threads dedicated to each individual engine specification, advice on living with the car, which covers everything from hypermiling to vendors for parts, it's a must for potential buyers of the car.Īs Chevy intended, the Cobalt SS became a part of the tuning scene, its four-cylinder engine has a lot of untapped potential producing only 200 HP from the factory. The car has a forum dedicated to it CobaltSS.Net here long after the car's introduction is a flourishing community of those who own the car. ![]() Some have been tuned to make more than 500 HP. The Cobalt SS became a huge part of the tuning scene, so much so that it featured in numerous Need For Speed games during its lifetime. It runs contrary to sports car design, where the bonnet is long and the rear short. It is easily recognizable, with a long sloping rear window that is accented by a spoiler from the factory. The two-door variation has a distinctive side profile, still very obviously a product of basic computer design but one that is well proportioned. With chunkier bumpers and alloy wheels, the saloon SS is a remarkable improvement over the base model, but it is no rival to the coupe. The four-door variant of the car is very utilitarian in design, boxy, and with a little flare, it could come from no other than noughties General Motors. This economy styling continues in the rest of the car most obviously with the saloon. Its European rivals do not have the same feeling. The Cobalt was a replacement for the Caviliar, a compact economy car the SS may have been a step above this, but sharing the same underpinnings as the base car, the SS falls short in terms of interior quality, suffering from the same affliction as the Neon SRT-4. ![]()
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