Mind Your Mines: The Push to Make Mining Safer and Cleaner

How to Save a Planet

Gimlet

Science, News, Society & Culture

4.8 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 24 March 2022

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

To avoid the worst impacts of climate change, we need to stop digging up fossil fuels. But the switch to renewables doesn’t mean we stop digging altogether. Wind turbines contain literal tons of copper and iron. Batteries for electric vehicles contain lithium, cobalt and nickel. All those materials come out of the ground—and we need to dig up more of them to power the switch to renewables. In other words, we need more mining. But mines can wreak havoc on the environment and on communities living nearby. One group of unlikely allies is trying to change that. Today on the show: the global push to make mining cleaner and safer. Guests: Aimee Boulanger, Executive Director of the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance Nuskmata, Land Defender, Nuxalk and Secwepemc Nations Jon Samuel, Global Head of Responsible Business Partnerships at Anglo American Jessica Duran, Social Responsibility Coordinator for Carrizal Mining The U.S. Department of the Interior is working to strengthen mining regulations. In the coming months, you can provide public comment on these efforts and make your voice heard! Check out this map of mines—past, present and proposed—from the U.S. Geological Survey. So many mines! Check out our Calls to Action archive here for all of the actions we've recommended on the show. Send us your ideas or feedback with our Listener Mail Form. And follow us on Twitter and Instagram. How to Save a Planet is a Spotify original podcast and Gimlet production hosted by Alex Blumberg. This episode was produced by Daniel Ackerman. The rest of our reporting and producing team includes Kendra Pierre-Louis, Rachel Waldholz, Anna Ladd and Hannah Chinn. Our supervising producer is Katelyn Bogucki. Our editor is Caitlin Kenney. Our intern is Nicole Welch. Sound design and mixing by Peter Leonard, with original music by Peter Leonard and Emma Munger. Our fact checker for this episode is Claudia Geib. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to how to save a planet, I'm Alex Bloomberg.
0:05.8	This is the show where we talk about what we need to do to address climate change and
0:09.6	how to make those things happen.
0:14.8	So, on this podcast, we talked quite a bit about the energy transition, moving from
0:29.1	a fossil fuel-based society to a renewable energy-based society.
0:35.3	And as we've spoken about before, that transition is well underway.
0:40.4	Solar and wind are as cheap or cheaper than any other form of energy out there.
0:44.9	Electric vehicle sales are growing exponentially and getting better and cheaper all the time.
0:50.0	And this new world, when we get to it, will be objectively better.
0:54.1	More efficient, less polluting, quieter.
0:58.2	But the road to that fossil fuel-free future does have some bumps in it.
1:04.5	Here to tell us about those bumps is how to save a planet producer, Daniel Ackeren.
1:09.6	Hey, Dan.
1:10.6	Hey, Alex.
1:11.8	So those bumps on the road to renewables, they're made of stuff like copper and lithium
1:16.6	and nickel and cobalt, basically metals.
1:19.7	Like we're going to need tons of metals, millions of tons to make this transition work.
1:24.6	Right, because we need to build a lot of things to make our electricity and run our electric
1:30.1	vehicles, our cars and buses, and all those new things require metals.
1:35.8	Exactly.
1:36.8	To make a single wind turbine, you need multiple tons of copper, solar panels, use iron and aluminum,
1:44.7	and more obscure metals like cadmium and gallium and indium.
	...

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