The names Tesla, Renault and Volvo mean nothing to Pierre*. He has never heard of an electric car. But as he heads out to work each morning in the bustling, dusty town of Fungurume, in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s southern mining belt, he is the first link in a supply chain that is fuelling the electric vehicle revolution and its promise of a decarbonised future.
Pierre is mining for cobalt, one of the world’s most sought-after minerals, and a key ingredient in the batteries that power most electric vehicles (EVs).
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. Not that lunch is worth waiting for: he claims he is given just two small bread rolls and a carton of juice.
“The salary is very, very small. It gives me a headache … The mine makes so much and we make so little,” he says.
If he takes a day off, he says money is deducted from his wages. If he is sick and misses more than two days in a month, more money is cut. “You can’t even argue. If you do, you’ll be fired,” he says, squatting on the dirt floor of the bare brick shack he rents.

Germany was supposed to be a model for solving global warming. In 2007, the country’s government announced that it would reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent by the year 2020. This was the kind of bold, aggressive climate goal scientists said was needed in all developed countries. If Germany could do it, it would prove the target possible.
So far, Germany has reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 27.7 percent—an astonishing achievement for a developed country with a highly developed manufacturing sector. But with a little over a year left to go, despite dedicating $580 billion toward a low-carbon energy system, the country “is likely to fall short of its goals for reducing harmful carbon-dioxide emissions,” Bloomberg News reported on Wednesday. And the reason for that may come down not to any elaborate solar industry plans, but something much simpler: cars.

The incoming Biden Administration has a big, ambitious green agenda for the interlocking spheres of automobiles, transportation and energy that calls for at investment of at least $2 trillion. The large pool of funding would give consumers continued access to cash and provide the trifecta of industries more capital to push wider adoption of electric vehicles.
Likely included in the new administration’s plans is another round of extended unemployment benefits and/or stimulus payments direct to taxpayers. Job creation in the automotive or transportation sector also is at the top of the list alongside support for EVs and EV charging stations. The development of smart highways that improve safety and hasten autonomous driving, infrastructure improvement, increased mass transit and return to higher fuel economy standards also is likely on the table.
As a first priority, the U.S. auto industry will benefit from consumers receiving a new economic stimulus right away–possibly similar to the spring-summer $1,200 Economic Impact Payments. That’s at least the consensus of automakers and a handful of industry economists. This would help consumers pay their bills and create more disposable income that they could put back into the sector to keep the auto sales recovery rolling.