(PDF) The decarbonisation divide: Contextualizing landscapes of low-carbon exploitation and toxicity in Africa

The decarbonisation divide: contextualizing landscapes of  low­carbon exploitation and toxicity in Africa Article (Published Version) Sovacool, Benjamin K, Hook, Andrew, Martiskainen, Mari, Brock, Andrea and Turnheim, Bruno (2019) The decarbonisation divide: contextualizing landscapes of low-carbon exploitation and toxicity in Africa. Global Environmental Change, 60. a102028. ISSN 0959-3780 This version is available from Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/88765/ This document is made available in accordance with publisher policies and may differ from the published version or from the version of record. If you wish to cite this item you are advised to consult the publisher’s version. Please see the URL above for details on accessing the published version. Copyright and reuse: Sussex Research Online is a digital repository of the research output of the University. 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Sovacoola,b, , Andrew Hooka, Mari Martiskainena, Andrea Brockc, ⁎ Bruno Turnheima,d,e a Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU), University of Sussex, Jubilee Building, Room 367, Falmer, East Sussex, BN1 9SL, United Kingdom b Center for Energy Technologies, Department of Business Development and Technology, Aarhus University, Denmark c International Relations, School of Global Studies, University of Sussex, United Kingdom d University of Manchester, United Kingdom e Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire Sciences Innovations Sociétés (LISIS) - CNRS, ESIEE, INRAE, UPEM - Université Paris-Est Marne-la-Vallée, France ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Keywords: Much academic research on low-carbon transitions focuses on the diffusion or use of innovations such as electric Energy transitions vehicles or solar panels, but overlooks or obscures downstream and upstream processes, such as mining or waste Energy justice flows. Yet it is at these two extremes where emerging low-carbon transitions in mobility and electricity are Extractive industries effectively implicated in toxic pollution, biodiversity loss, exacerbation of gender inequality, exploitation of Democratic Republic of the Congo child labor, and the subjugation of ethnic minorities. We conceptualize these processes as part of an emerging Ghana “decarbonisation divide.” To illustrate this divide with clear insights for political ecology, sustainability tran- sitions, and energy justice research, this study draws from extensive fieldwork examining cobalt mining in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and the processing and recycling of electronic waste in Ghana. It utilizes original data from 34 semi-structured research interviews with experts and 69 community interviews with artisanal cobalt miners, e-waste scrapyard workers, and other stakeholders, as well as 50 site visits. These visits included 30 industrial and artisanal cobalt mines in the DRC, as well as associated infrastructure such as trading depots and processing centers, and 20 visits to the Agbogbloshie scrapyard and neighborhood alongside local waste collection sites, electrical repair shops, recycling centers, and community e-waste dumps in Ghana. The study proposes a concerted set of policy recommendations for how to better address issues of exploitation and toxicity, suggestions that go beyond the often-touted solutions of formalisation or financing. Ultimately, the study holds that we must all, as researchers, planners, and citizens, broaden the criteria and analytical para- meters we use to evaluate the sustainability of low-carbon transitions. 1. Introduction most recent outlook that between 2015 and 2050, the share of low- carbon electricity in total final energy consumption needs to double as The window of opportunity for mitigating climate change is closing. technologies such as electric vehicles (EV), battery storage, heat pumps, Limiting global warming to 1.5 °C will require reaching 80% zero- and solar PV become mainstream. emission energy by 2030 and 100% by 2050 (IPCC 2018). Cumulative Underlying these much-heralded trends, however, is concomitant greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions must at least be reduced by a further growth in the demand for critical materials, minerals, and metals. The 470 gigatons (Gt) by 2050 compared to “business as usual” practices. International Resource Panel (2019) recently noted that resource ex- Such climate policy imperatives have sparked a veritable shift to traction has more than tripled since 1970, underwriting a fivefold in- lower-carbon innovations, technologies, and pathways—a process crease in the use of non-metallic minerals; and that by 2060, global known as decarbonisation—across a variety of domains. According to material use could double to 190 billion tons. recent scenarios, decarbonisation would imply a rapid ramping up of One of the other key consequences of the expansion in low carbon several low-carbon systems and associated technologies. The technology is the significant growth in flows of electronic waste (e- International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA, 2018) reports in their waste), a toxic and persistent waste stream which includes discarded ⁎ Corresponding author at: Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU), University of Sussex, Jubilee Building, Room 367, Falmer, East Sussex, BN1 9SL, United Kingdom E-mail address:

(B.K. Sovacool). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2019.102028 Received 22 May 2019; Received in revised form 2 December 2019; Accepted 12 December 2019 0959-3780/ © 2019 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/BY/4.0/). B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 wind turbine components, electric vehicle batteries, solar panels, smart worsen some fundamental patterns of exclusion and inequality meters, heat pumps, and a variety of other devices and products (Baldé (Peet et al., 2011). The supposed “cleanness” and “greenness” of low- et al., 2017). Each year some 44.7 million metric tons of e-waste are carbon technologies can be questioned to the extent that they depend generated, an amount equivalent to about 4500 Eiffel Towers (Baldé on dirty flows of mineral extraction which only perpetuate neocolonial et al., 2017). The amount of e-waste is rising by about 8 million tons dependence, economic inequality, and degradation of the environment annually, adding to a total global inventory of about 50 million tons; of (e.g. Dunlap 2018; Sánchez De Jaegher 2018; Zehner 2012). Low- this waste, only approximately 20 percent is recycled (Daum 2017). carbon technologies constitute, critics claim, a continuation of old Within these waste flows are various components and materials with patterns of accumulation and degradation, hiding the true costs of significant health and environmental harms including brominated consumption while connecting capital with new “green” markets. They flame-retardants, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and toxic metals can even come to displace vulnerable people from their lands or live- including lead, copper, mercury, and cadmium lihood through a process of enclosure and exclusion known as “energy (Amankwaa et al. 2017). There is an unevenness and environmental dispossessions” (Baka 2017). Under such twisted dynamics, proposed health calamity in the production and consumption of e-waste: the solutions, such as renewable energy or electric vehicles, can transform main producers are Europe and the United States, but the main re- into problems. ceivers or importers are in Africa and Asia (Sthiannopkao and Wong Secondly, our study attempts to better connect place-specific no- 2013). tions of geography and space to sustainability transitions, to better In this study, we argue that such unevenness extends not only to the comprehend the spatial differentiation of transitions and the power backend of low-carbon technologies (e-waste) but also its frontend relations they entail. Lawhon and Murphy (2012: 355) particularly call (mining and materials), and we term this disparity the “decarbonisation for sustainability transitions research to pay greater attention to divide.” We explore the extent to which the diffusion of technology “the sustainability of global value chains and production networks” as behind global low-carbon transitions negatively impacts communities well as “globalization and its effect on the sustainability of livelihoods.” at opposite ends of the supply chain: upstream, at sites of extraction of They point to a potential “geographical naïveté” of research that fails to critical materials such as cobalt and copper; and downstream, at look at the specific ways in which institutions, actors, knowledge, and scrapyards and facilities handling their waste streams. The aims and other factors coalesce to create very place specific transitions dynamics. objectives of the study are threefold: to document and humanize how Bridge et al. (2013: 337) meanwhile state that it is essential to analyze communities cope with the negative impacts of decarbonisation, to relationships between the “locations, landscapes and territorialisations reveal tensions and tradeoffs between global climate policy and local associated with a low-carbon energy transition”. Swilling et al. (2016) justice concerns, and to steer more informed local, national, and global argue that transitions researchers need to better grapple with the socio- sustainability action. political regimes present within developing countries that can shape Drawn from extensive original field research in the Democratic and intertwine with the development or deployment of specific tech- Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Ghana, we ask: How are the tech- nologies. Köhler et al. (2019: 16) write that transitions research needs nologies used in low-carbon transitions linked to negative impacts in to more actively consider the ethical considerations and implications of upstream and downstream parts of their lifecycle? Relatedly, what transitions. Köhler et al. (2019: 8) also implore that researchers ex- vulnerabilities can low-carbon transitions exacerbate in such mining amine “how power is exercised by different actors and structures to and e-waste communities? Lastly, what may be reasonably done to achieve or obstruct sustainability transitions,” and to scrutinize the mitigate such negative impacts? We answer these questions via a qua- “(un)intended political implications of transition processes regarding litative, mixed methods approach involving semi-structured expert in- structural power inequalities in class, race, gender, and geographical terviews, community interviews, and repeated site visits throughout the location” (Köhler et al, 2019:8). The implication across these studies is former Katanga province of the DRC, and Accra and Agbogbloshie, the need better reconcile transitions with place-specific expressions of Ghana. Our results reveal truly troubling connections between dec- governance, politics, and power—which we do here. arbonisation and ecological destruction, and degradation of community Our findings lastly buttress growing evidence of global environ- health, in these regions, alongside issues of gender inequality and pa- mental or “energy injustice,” where the benefits and costs of resource triarchy, child labor, and the dispossession and marginalization of use are exclusionary, racialized and/or gendered (Heiman 1996; ethnic groups. Put simply: under current arrangements, cobalt mining Martuzzi et al., 2010; Fuller and McCauley 2016). Whereas Yenneti and and e-waste processing, so intimately tied to low-carbon energy tran- Day (2015, 2016) and Yenneti et al. (2016) have explored the proce- sitions, degrade local environmental health, disempower women, ex- dural and distributional injustices related to the implementation of ploit children, and worsen ethnic discrimination. These attributes solar energy projects in India, our study shows the circulation of in- question the very idea of sustainable energy generation. justices across a Global South and Global North divide. In doing so, the Our study shows that a decarbonized and largely digital economy is study responds explicitly to calls for more “multi-scalar” or “whole generating a range of serious human and environmental impacts for systems” thinking within energy justice approaches communities in the Global South. These impacts are interacting with (Bickerstaff et al. 2013; Sovacool et al., 2019). Jenkins et al. (2016:179) already-existing inequalities and vulnerabilities that are structured by compellingly write that “whole systems” approaches are integral in age, class, gender, patterns of globalization and geography. Exploring helping us to gain a fuller understanding of the “entire energy chain, these aspects within this study touches on multiple themes and di- from mining, conversion, production, transmission, and distribution, mensions, including energy, environmental and climate justice right through to energy consumption and waste.” Bouzarovski and (Jenkins 2018), environmental and public health Simcock (2017: 464) propose an avowedly normative research ap- (Srinivasa et al. 2003), accountability and governance (Bäckstrand proach to whole energy systems that is concerned with attempting to 2008), trading patterns and the circulation of global goods and services better understand “the processes through which the relationship be- (Coe et al., 2004), political economy (Sovacool 2019a), and the unin- tween energy poverty, on the one hand, and wider socio-environmental tended implications of policy (Jensen et al., 2015). In particular, the contingencies such as climate change, urban and rural social segrega- findings from our study inform debates within at least the three sepa- tion, and global chains of energy provision, on the other.” It is our hope rate fields: political ecology, sustainability transitions, and energy jus- that revealing these multi-scalar and whole systems dynamics to in- tice. justice in this study will help to problematize and contest future low- Firstly, the study contributes to ongoing political ecology delibera- carbon transitions and development pathways, pushing them to have tions because it seeks to reveal how political, social, economic, and more equitable outcomes. environmental factors fuse together to create winners and losers, and 2 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 2. Background: linking low-carbon transitions to minerals extraction and electronic waste In order to introduce and emphasize the link between low-carbon transitions, mining and metals, and waste, this section provides some background and future projections. At the simplest level, a low-carbon transition requires a significant and sustained shift to low-carbon technologies. According to IRENA (2018), the number of electric vehicles (EVs) needs to jump from almost one million in 2015 to one billion cars in 2050 (more precisely from 1.24 million passenger cars to 965 million passenger cars); from 200,000 electric buses and trucks/lorries to 57 million; and from 200 million electric scooters and bikes to 2.16 billion. The amount of bat- tery storage similarly needs to climb from 0.5 gigawatt hours (GWh) to 12,380 GWh. The number of heat pumps in households needs to jump from 20 million to 253 million. IRENA (2018) lastly reports that the amount of installed solar PV capacity must rise from 223 gigawatts (GW) to 7122 GW. The International Energy Agency (IEA), known for being con- servative in its projections about renewables (Carrington and Stephenson 2018), has nevertheless presented low carbon energy ex- pansion scenarios that are correspondingly optimistic. As Fig. 1 shows, the IEA (2018) anticipates that EVs will rise to at least 125 million cars and trucks/lorries by 2030. Deployment of installed utility-scale battery storage systems are expected to jump from a mere 4 GW in 2018 to 220 GW by 2040 (Pavarini 2019). From 2017 to 2023, solar PV is expected to lead the growth in low-carbon electricity additions, growing by al- most 570 GW (IEA 2019). A report from the consulting company McKinsey & Company (2019: 3) assessed these trends, and deduced that “energy companies should be planning for an industrial revolution driven by renewables” and that “by 2035, renewables (solar and wind) will account for more than 50% of global power generation; electric vehicles will be the low-cost option for car, van and small-truck drivers; oil demand will be declining; and gas demand will have peaked.” In terms of the upstream extraction of materials, many types of re- newable energy and other low-carbon technologies require a multitude of metals, minerals, and resources in their construction. A recent report calculated that expected demand for fourteen metals central to the manufacturing of renewable energy, EVs, and storage technolo- gies—such as copper, cobalt, nickel, and lithium—will grow substantially in the next few decades (Dominish et al., 2019). Table 1 shows the top 20 resources (by weight) needed to make an equivalent GW of centralized low-carbon electricity supply. This ranges from 115,500 tons per GW for Fig. 1. Global projections of rising demand for electric vehicles, battery storage, and solar PV. Source: Authors, compiled by the most recent data from the biomass to 602,283 tons for a GW of installed hydroelectricity. More- International Energy Agency. Note: PLDV = personal light duty vehicle. over, automation and digitization have already become deeply em- PHEV = plug-in hybrid electric vehicle. BEV = battery electric vehicle. LCV = low- bedded in most passenger cars available on the market today, with a high carbon vehicle. PV = photovoltaic. APAC = Asia Pacific. level of computing and sophistication built into vehicles (and thus ma- terials intensity across those supply chains and sectors). About 40% of the cost of a standard new vehicle relates to digital devices, sensors, Electric vehicles and their lithium ion batteries are now the largest displays, computers, and electronics (Appleby 2019). These components source of cobalt demand, overtaking mobile phones and consumer all need specialized metals and minerals. electronics in 2017 (Moores 2018a). ERG (2018), a mining company, Bazilian (2018: 93) calls this “the mineral foundation” of the energy estimates that due to the Paris Agreement, cobalt demand in electric transition, and notes it relates not only to low-carbon sources of elec- vehicle batteries will grow by 200% between 2018 and 2020, and again tricity such as wind turbines or solar panels, but also to energy-efficient by 500% by 2025, when the battery market is expected to be worth lamps and lighting, electric vehicles, fuel cells, and batteries for de- $100 billion. Industry projections anticipate that the manufacturing of centralized storage. One study projected material stock increases be- lithium ion batteries will more than quadruple from 2018 levels by 2028 tween 2015 and 2060 for selected technologies, and the numbers are (Moores 2019). dizzying: there is an expected increase of 87,000% for battery electric At the downstream, or “end of life,” low-carbon systems are in- vehicles, 1000% for wind power, and 3000% for solar PV power creasingly coming to dominate flows of e-waste, especially solar panels, (Månberger and Stenqvist 2018). This could be why the batteries, and wind turbines. Cucchiella et al. (2015) suggest that solar World Bank (2018: 3) concluded that “the clean energy transition will energy panels “represent the most significant waste stream” within e- be significantly mineral intensive.” waste because they are by far the heaviest source by category of weight. In terms of decentralized low carbon technologies, the metal cobalt While computer notebooks entail 3.5 kgs of waste and televisions up to in particular is a critical input into not only batteries but also super- 25 kgs of waste, a typical household solar energy system entails 80 kgs alloys, plastics and dyes, magnets, and adhesives (Köllner 2018). of waste (Cucchiella et al. 2015). A joint report between IRENA and IEA 3 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Table 1 Materials for Nuclear and Renewable Energy Power Plant Construction (tons/installed GWe). Source: Sovacool (2010). Biomass Nuclear Wind Geothermal Hydroelectric Solar Aluminum 255 18 0 255 240 22,500 Cadmium 0 0 0 0 0 40 Chromium 122 0 0 122 100 0 Concrete 74,257 179,681 305,891 74,257 578,704 60,000 Copper 454 729 211 454 550 2000 Gallium 0 0 0 0 0 3.5 Germanium 0 0 0 0 0 2 Glass 0 0 0 0 0 13 Fiberglass 0 0 19,863 0 0 0 Indium 0 0 0 0 0 20 Lead 0 46 0 0 0 0 Manganese 112 434 0 112 80 0 Molybdenum 42 0 0 42 0 0 Nickel 10 125 0 10 5 0 Plastic 0 0 0 0 0 3250 Silicon 0 0 0 0 0 6500 Silver 0 0.5 0 0 0 0.3 Steel 40,293 36,068 84,565 51,044 32,604 75,000 Tellurium 0 0 0 0 0 46.7 Vanadium 4 0 0 4 0 0 Total 115,550 217,101 410,530 126,300 602,283 169,363 currently recycled (Gardiner 2017: 2). Hartley (2019) notes that li- thium ion batteries are not suitable for landfill, mainly due to possible reactions with water and toxicity, meaning they must enter e-waste streams. However, lithium ion batteries are also perceived within the industry as difficult to recycle given that they can swell and warp, can produce uncontrolled thermal reactions, and have even been known to combust when mishandled, as they have in some mobile phones and electric vehicle applications (SRS Media 2019). The implication is that such batteries will more likely than not become an additional burden to e-waste flows rather than be recycled. Even wind energy contributes to e-waste. Sovacool et al. (2016) conducted an environmental “profit and loss’” analysis of the manu- facturing of wind turbines in Northern Europe. They noted that the materials intensity of wind turbines—involving nacelles, generators, Fig. 2. Projected electronic waste flows associated with solar PV, 2016 to 2050. blades, foundations, hubs, towers, power units, and transformer uni- Source: Kumar et al. 2017. ts—precipitates large volumes of e-waste. They calculated that a single 3.1 MW wind turbine created 772 to 1807 tons of landfill waste, 40 to (IRENA and IEA-PVPS 2016) estimated that at the upper range, global 85 tons of waste sent for incineration and about 7.3 tons of e-waste per solar panel waste amounted to 250,000 t in 2016. However, they noted unit. Enevoldsen et al. (2019) project that Europe will need to install at that by 2050, solar panels could become equivalent to 10% of global e- least 100,000 new wind turbines by 2050. By these calculations, wind waste streams. They also projected that by 2050, cumulative volumes of energy will result in another 730,000 tons of e-waste. end-of-life solar waste could reach 20 million tons in China, 10 million tons in the United States, and 7.5 million tons in Japan, or a worldwide 3. Case study selection and research methods total of 60 to 78 million tons of waste across all countries (see Fig. 2). This would make solar PV waste flows greater than all e-waste flows in Our study was based on a mixed methods research design utilizing 2018 (Kumar et al. 2017). Greenmatch (2017) put these numbers into two case studies and data collected via expert interviews, community perspective by noting that 60 million tons of solar waste in 2050 would interviews, and field research including repeated and multiple site represent a potential material influx—the amount of wasted solar ma- visits. terials and components—sufficient to produce 2 billion new panels, or 630 GW of installed capacity worth $11 to 15 billion in recoverable 3.1. Case selection value. Despite the sheer magnitude and potential value of solar energy waste, however, such waste streams are only rarely recognized or To examine the contours of upstream and downstream impacts of currently accounted for, especially in the Global South low-carbon transitions on mining and waste processing communities, (Mulvaney 2013; Mulvaney 2014; Cross and Murray 2018). we selected two case studies based on their current and projected sig- Lithium ion batteries are meanwhile one of the fastest growing nificance in material flows: the Katanga region of the Democratic contributors to global e-waste (Baldé et al., 2017). Growth in electric Republic of the Congo, and the Agbogbloshie and Accra districts in vehicle markets between 2017 and 2030 is expected to create 11 mil- Ghana. lion tons of spent lithium ion batteries in need of recycling; as Gardiner The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) was selected because it (2017: 2) noted when discerning these trends: “there's going to be a significantly dominates the global production of cobalt. In 2018 the DRC storm of electric vehicle batteries that will reach the end of their life in produced 90,000 tons of unrefined cobalt, or 64.3% of the world's total, a few years.” However, in the European Union, known for prioritizing and it had 49% of the world's known cobalt reserves—more than the next resource efficiency, as little as 5 percent of lithium ion batteries are top ten countries in the world combined (U.S. Geological Survey 2019). 4 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Fig. 3. Case study selection of the Katanga Region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Agbogbloshie Ghana scrapyard for global electronic waste flows. Source: Mees et al. (2013), Daum et al. (2017). Note: The Katanga Region of the DRC is shown in the grey shaded area of the top panel b. Industry analysts predict that DRC's dominance will only grow in the 3.2.1. Expert interviews future, with the country's share of global cobalt production set to rise to In the DRC, 23 semi-structured expert research interviews were 75% by 2021 (Moores 2018b). Almost all of the DRC's cobalt resources conducted between February and April 2019, and in Ghana, 11 semi- are concentrated in one region, the “geological scandal” of Katanga structured expert research interviews were conducted between January (Sovacool 2019a: 918), which contains an estimated 3.6 million tons of and March 2019. Experts were purposively selected to represent a recoverable cobalt (World Bank 2007). This region of the DRC is shown variety of institutions involved with knowledge of mining in the DRC, in Fig. 3. or e-waste in Ghana. These experts were primarily located in the DRC Agbogbloshie, a neighborhood within the Greater Accra and Ghana but also in other locations such as Belgium, the Netherlands, Metropolitan Area of Ghana, was chosen because of its high-volumes of the United Kingdom, and the United States (to help provide background e-waste, which is mostly imported from Europe and North America and context). Our interview sample included the government agencies (Schluep 2012). Even though it is a relatively small area—less than a and ministries, international civil society groups, local civil society square mile in total size—Agbogbloshie is the “main hub” nationally for groups, private sector firms and organizations, academic institutions, e-waste, being home to at least 40,000 people living and working and independent research institutes shown in Table 2. around the scrapyard (Akortia et al. 2017). Sovacool (2019b) reports In each country, the lead author undertook the field research and that more than 90% of e-waste flows within Ghana are processed at was hosted by local partners, who helped to both identify possible in- Agbogbloshie, and that the e-waste business there is estimated to be a terviewees and facilitate meetings. During each interview, experts were $100 million annual enterprise. Agbogbloshie is also unique in its asked to comment on the risks and benefits low-carbon transitions were proximity to local communities and the cohabitation of the scrapyard bringing their communities; who was significantly impacted or vul- alongside a yam market, tomato market, onion market, football pitch, nerable; and what policy changes needed implementing. Each interview and mosque (as shown in the bottom panel of Fig. 3). lasted between 45 and 120 min, and respondents were guaranteed full anonymity to encourage candor and protect respondents from potential retaliation. Each participant was given a unique respondent number 3.2. Data collection shown in Table 1 (e.g. CER1 to CER23 for the DRC, and GER1 to GER11 for Ghana), referred to throughout in the rest of the paper. Our data collection consisted of three different parts: interviews To ensure reliability within the research team, each interview was with experts, interviews with community members and repeated site fully transcribed, to ensure nothing was missed. Every transcript was visits. 5 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Table. 2 Expert interview respondents relating to cobalt mining in the DRC and e-waste in Ghana, 2019. Source: Authors. No. Institution Country CER1 University of Liège Belgium CER2 Benchmark Minerals Intelligence UK CER3 Centre for environment and health, ku leuven Belgium CER4 University of Groningen Netherlands CER5 Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH DRC CER6 University of Bath UK CER7 University of Liège Belgium CER8 Institute for Development Studies UK CER9 Colorado School of Mines USA CER10 Environmental Studies Department, San Jose State University USA CER11 Université de Kinshasa DRC CER12 Service d'Assistance et d'Encadrement du Small Scale Mining (SAESSCAM), recently renamed SAEMAPE DRC CER13 Ministry of Mines DRC CER14 German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (BGR) DRC CER15 Universite de Lubumbashi DRC CER16 Universite de Lubumbashi DRC CER17 Universite de Lubumbashi DRC CER18 The Carter centre DRC CER19 The Carter centre DRC CER20 The Carter centre DRC CER21 Glencorps DRC CER22 University of Delaware USA CER23 Resource Matters DRC GER1 Department of Geography and Resource Development, University of Ghana Ghana GER2 Institute for African Studies Ghana GER3 Institute for Environment and Sanitation Studies Ghana GER4 School of Public Health, University of Ghana Ghana GER5 Environment Protection Agency (EPA) Ghana GER6 Ministry of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation (MESTI) Ghana GER7 Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) Ghana GER8 Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) Ghana GER9 Scrap Dealers Association at Agbogbloshie Ghana GER10 Greater Accra Scrap Dealers Association Ghana GER11 World Resources Forum and Green Advocacy Ghana coded, and then placed into a single file using a software program The visits included a mix of mines owned by different entities (Aus- called Nvivo, which allows transcripts to be stored and searched by tralian, Congolese, Chinese, South African, joint ventures) and locations keywords and content. (Fungurume, Kisanfu, Kolwezi, Likasi, Lubumbashi, Mulunwishi, and Museba), as well as active and inactive mining sites, legal and illegal 3.2.2. Community interviews sites, and sites at exploration phases but also production and decom- Given the research design sought to understand community per- missioning phases. In Ghana, this involved 20 site visits to: three se- ceptions and impacts, expert interviews were coupled with community parate visits to the Agbogbloshie scrapyard and neighborhood but also interviews (shown in Table 3) throughout the cobalt mining and e- local waste collection sites, electrical repair shops, recycling centers, waste sectors. In the DRC, this involved interviewing artisanal and in- and community e-waste dumps on the periphery of Accra. Each of these dustrial cobalt miners (called diggers, creuseurs or kwanda) as well as naturalistic site visits lasted between 20 and 180 min. artisanal bosses or chiefs, crushers, carriers, drivers, refiners, safety Finally, the study presents a fairly large number of photographs and inspectors, sorters, labor unions and even members of the mining po- images related to cobalt mining in the Congo and e-waste in Ghana, lice. In Ghana, this involved interviewing e-waste scrapyard workers at collected during the fieldwork. Explicit permission was given by each Agbogbloshie (and their families), labor leaders, politicians, and those participant to use these photos in our research outputs. Fig. 4 showcases supporting miners via marketing and vending. In total, 48 community three of the field research sites in the Democratic Republic of the interviews were conducted in the DRC, and 21 were conducted in Congo, and two of these sites in Ghana. Ghana, following the same questions or “script” as the expert inter- For all community interviews and site visits, in the DRC the lead views. These interviews tended to be shorter than the expert interviews. author travelled with a team of Congolese research assistants who Each respondent was guaranteed anonymity, and also assigned a un- spoke English, French, and local languages. In Ghana the lead author ique respondent number (e.g. CCR1 to CCR48 for the DRC, and GCR1 to travelled with a team of Ghanaian research assistants who spoke GCR21 for Ghana). English and local languages. In the DRC, the research team was given The same transcription and coding protocol for the expert inter- exceptional access as our Ordre de Mission, our permit to undertake views was applied to these community interviews. research, was sponsored collectively by the University of Lubumbashi, the Congolese Ministry of Education, both the provincial governors of 3.2.3. Site visits Haut-Katanga (home to the mines in Likasi and Lubumbashi) and Finally, to complement the interviews, extensive site visits were Lualaba (home to the mines in Kolwezi and Fungurume), and the undertaken throughout the DRC and Ghana. In the DRC, this involved Congolese Secret Service. Our team also included a justice advocate, a 30 site visits to: 1 archive of mining documents, 11 large scale and Congolese lawyer, to enhance the legitimacy of the visits, but also to industrial mines, 2 smelters, 10 artisanal mines, 6 artisanal trading minimize opportunities for corruption. In Ghana, the team was given depots, and 1 artisanal refinery or processing center shown in Table 4. repeated access to Agbogbloshie because we were hosted by the School 6 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Table 3 Community interview respondents in the DRC and Ghana, 2019. Source: Authors. No. Title Institution Location CCR1 Safety Coordinator Gécamines (state-owned mining company) Lubumbashi, DRC CCR2 Industrial miner Gécamines (state-owned mining company) Kinshasa, DRC CCR3 Safety inspector L'entreprise minière Congo Dongfang Mining (CDM) Lubumbashi, DRC CCR4 Digger Artisanal miner, Ruashi Lubumbashi, DRC CCR5 Digger Artisanal miner, Ruashi Lubumbashi, DRC CCR6 Digger and sorter Artisanal miner, Ruashi Lubumbashi, DRC CCR7 Driver Nyati Cross Border Transport (Copper transport and logistics) Lubumbashi, DRC CCR8 Owner/manager/boss Kasulo Artisanal mine Kolwezi, DRC CCR9-14 Diggers Kasulo Artisanal mine Kolwezi, DRC CCR15-17 Sorters and carriers Depot 169 Kolwezi, DRC CCR18 Carrier Depot 169 Kolwezi, DRC CCR19-21 Refiners/melters Depot 2 Kolwezi, DRC CCR22 Carrier Depot 1000 Kolwezi, DRC CCR23 Refiner/melter Depot 1000 Kolwezi, DRC CCR24 Crusher Depot Thomas Boss Billy Kisanfu, DRC CCR25 Sorter Depot Thomas Boss Billy Kisanfu, DRC CCR26 Sorter and carrier Depot Thomas Boss Billy Kisanfu, DRC CCR27 Industrial miner Tenke Fungurume Mine Fungurume, DRC CCR28 Industrial miner Ruashi Mining (operating at TFM) Fungurume, DRC CCR29 Manager/boss Solola and Kabica Artisanal Mines Fungurume, DRC CCR30-33 Diggers Solola and Kabica Artisanal Mines Fungurume, DRC CCR34 Boss/dealer/trader Katanga and Fungurume Artisanal Mines Fungurume, DRC CCR35-39 Digger Katanga and Fungurume Artisanal Mines Fungurume, DRC CCR40 Captain Fungurume Mining Police Fungurume, DRC CCR41 President Fungurume Mining Negotiator Association Fungurume, DRC CCR42 Officer Fungurume Mining Police Fungurume, DRC CCR43 Chief Depot 18 Museba, DRC CCR44-45 Sorters and crushers Depot 18 Museba, DRC CCR46 Boss/manager Kawama Artisanal Mine Lubumbashi, DRC CCR47-48 Diggers Kawama Artisanal Mine Lubumbashi, DRC GCR1 Community resident Greater Accra Scrap Dealers Association Accra, Ghana GCR2-3 Scrap collector Self-employed Accra, Ghana (airport residential area) GCR4 Scrap driver Self-employed Accra, Ghana GCR5 Repairer Progressive Electronics Technicians Accra, Ghana GCR6 Repairer Kojo God is Great Electronics Accra, Ghana GCR7 Chief Scrap workers gang Agbogbloshie, Ghana GCR8-9 Burners Scrap workers gang Agbogbloshie, Ghana GCR10 Collector Scrap workers gang Agbogbloshie, Ghana GCR11 Repairer My Son Electrical Shop Sege, Ghana GCR12 Former Chairman Accra Scrap Dealers Association Agbogbloshie, Ghana GCR13 Manager for sorting Accra Scrap Dealers Association Agbogbloshie, Ghana GCR14 Manager for repairing Accra Scrap Dealers Association Agbogbloshie, Ghana GCR15 Manager for transport Accra Scrap Dealers Association Agbogbloshie, Ghana GCR16 Dismantler Accra Scrap Dealers Association Agbogbloshie, Ghana GCR17 Manager for weighing Accra Scrap Dealers Association Agbogbloshie, Ghana GCR18 Chairman Accra Scrap Dealers Association Agbogbloshie, Ghana GCR19-21 Vice-bosses Accra Scrap Dealers Association Agbogbloshie, Ghana of Health at the University of Ghana, who was building a health clinic 4. Results: aggravated vulnerabilities within the “decarbonisation onsite, as well as the Ghanaian Environmental Protection Agency, who divide” was monitoring pollution levels. Despite the limitations above, the three methods together, and the photographs, resulted in the collection of a rich, unique qualitative 3.3. Study limitations dataset that extensively document the costs and risks to cobalt mining and e-waste recycling and reclamation. Four sets of vulnerabilities seem Despite an attempt at triangulation within the selected methods, our most acute in this so-called “decarbonisation divide,” and will be dis- approach does have some notable weaknesses. Although we sought to cussed in the sections to come: environmental and public health risks; include a diverse mix of stakeholders in our interviews, respondents gender discrimination and the marginalization of women; child labor were speaking of their perceptions (meaning some could have stated and exploitation; and the subjugation of ethnic groups. misperceptions) and were also speaking on their own behalf, not on behalf of their institutions. Moreover, due to presenting a wealth of original empirical material spread across the two case studies, we did 4.1. Environmental and public health not have sufficient space in this paper to conduct a rigorous literature review to confirm all of our findings. We lastly did not make an attempt Even though the Congolese and Ghanaian communities end up ei- to weight, correct, normalize, or problematize data across our methods, ther supplying critical metals to low-carbon technologies, or processing to avoid censoring our results and discussion, and also to meet the their waste flows, the environmental and public health risks associated energy justice principle of “recognition,” treating everyone's concerns with cobalt mining and e-waste processing are sizable, multifaceted, as valid (Jenkins et al., 2016; Sovacool et al., 2019). and persistent. 7 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Table 4 Naturalistic observation and site visits in the DRC and Ghana, 2019. Source: Authors. a. Congolese site visits No. Institution Type Description Location 1 Katanga Artisanal Mine Artisanal mine Copper and cobalt mine Fungurume, DRC 2 Tenke Fungurume Mine (TFM) Industrial Copper and cobalt mine Fungurume, DRC 3 Kabica Artisanal Mine Artisanal mine Copper and cobalt mine Fungurume, DRC 4 Solola Artisanal Mine Artisanal mine Copper and cobalt mine Fungurume, DRC 5 Tenke Fungurume Mine Concession Artisanal mine Copper and cobalt mine Fungurume, DRC 6 Depot Laylay Artisanal trader Copper and cobalt trader Kisanfu, DRC 7 Depot Thomas Boss Billy Artisanal trader Copper and cobalt trader Kisanfu, DRC 8 Lualaba Copper Smelter Industrial smelter Copper smelter Kolwezi, DRC 9 Mutanda Mining Industrial mine Copper and cobalt mine Kolwezi, DRC 10 La Sino-Congolaise des Mines (Sicomines) Industrial mine Copper and cobalt mine Kolwezi, DRC 11 Kasulo Artisanal mine Cobalt mine Kolwezi, DRC 12 Djoni Artisanal mine Copper and cobalt mine Kolwezi, DRC 13 Depot 2 Artisanal trader Copper and cobalt trader Kolwezi, DRC 14 Depot 1000 Artisanal trader Copper and cobalt trader Kolwezi, DRC 15 Depot 169 Artisanal refinery Copper and cobalt trader and refinery Kolwezi, DRC 16 CDM Kasulo Industrial mine Copper and cobalt mine Kolwezi, DRC 17 Shituru Mining Corporation (SMCO) Industrial mine Copper mine Likasi, DRC 18 Gécamines Midema Concession Industrial mine Copper and cobalt mine Likasi, DRC 19 Likasi Artisanal Mine 1 Artisanal mine Copper and cobalt mine Likasi, DRC 20 Likasi Artisanal Mine 2 Artisanal mine Copper and cobalt mine Likasi, DRC 21 centre de documentation sur le katanga et les regions avoisinantes (cedeka) Archive Repository for mining documents Lubumbashi, DRC 22 Gécamines copper smelter Industrial smelter Copper smelter and slag storage Lubumbashi, DRC 23 L'entreprise minière Congo Dongfang Mining (CDM) Industrial mine Copper and cobalt mine Lubumbashi, DRC 24 Huachin Mining Industrial mine Copper and cobalt mine Lubumbashi, DRC 25 Rwashi Mining Commune Industrial and artisanal mine Copper and cobalt mine Lubumbashi, DRC 26 MMG Industrial mine Copper and cobalt mine Lubumbashi, DRC 27 Kawama Artisanal Mine Artisanal mine Copper and cobalt mine Lubumbashi, DRC 28 CHEMAF Industrial Cobalt and copper Lubumbashi, DRC 29 Depot Samy 888 Artisanal trader Copper trader Mulunwishi, DRC 30 Depot 18 Artisanal trader Copper and cobalt trader Museba, DRC b. Ghanaian site visits No. Institution Location 1 Prodick Electrical Accra, Ghana 2 Comfort Coolair and Electrical Services Accra, Ghana 3 Progressive Electronics Technicians Accra, Ghana 4 Kojo Broni Phone and Laptop Repairs Accra, Ghana 5 Electricals Accra, Ghana 6 Kojo God is King Electrical Works Accra, Ghana 7 Old Fadama Market Agbogbloshie, Ghana 8 Agbogbloshie scrapyard Agbogbloshie, Ghana 9 My Son Electrical Shop Sege, Ghana 10 Dawa Steel Mill / Export Zone Dawa, Ghana 11 Adom Phone Repairs and Computer Hardware Tema, Ghana 12 Samuel Refrigeration and Electrical Services Dawhenya, Ghana 13 Republic Electrical New Dawhenya, Ghana 14 Accra Compost & Recycling Plant (ACARP) Accra, Ghana 15 Akooshi Recycling centre Accra, Ghana 16 Agbogbloshie scrapyard Agbogbloshie, Ghana 17 Old Fadama Market Agbogbloshie, Ghana 18 Agbogbloshie scrapyard Agbogbloshie, Ghana 19 Old Fadama Market Agbogbloshie, Ghana 20 Agbogbloshie Health Clinic Agbogbloshie, Ghana In the DRC, it is important to distinguish between two types of co- miners. CCR8, a miner, told the authors that: balt mining, large-scale industrial mining (often abbreviated as LSM, We mine cobalt in teams, usually 5–6 in a team though sometimes they and owned by foreign firms), and artisanal and small-scale mining can be as small as 4, or as large as 15. We use simple tools, such as a (abbreviated as ASM, and usually owned by local communities). LSM shovel and a pick axe. We mine at night, usually beginning at 5pm and cobalt mining techniques account for about 80% of national produc- going all the way until the sun rises the next day, around 6am, so a 13 h tion, employ much larger machinery and a high degree of mechaniza- shift. We dig a large room to ‘live’ in and then we remove side blocks or tion and automation, usually using a mix of surface scrapers, bulldo- ‘rooms’ of cobalt and copper. Sometimes we just stay in the mine. zers, and diggers, as well as excavators, dump trucks, dynamite, and acid (Sovacool 2019a). A single LSM cobalt and copper mine can pro- CER4, an industry expert, cautioned that “I wouldn't even call arti- duce more than 8 million tons per year (though most of that is copper). sanal mining, it's really collecting or scavenging, they don't have equipment ASM, by contrast, accounts for 20% of production but 98% of the to mine, they just dig.” Fig. 5, for example, shows two ASM cobalt mines workforce. It is low-tech, labor-intensive, and highly dangerous for the near Kasulu and Kawama that were little more than holes in the ground. 8 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Fig. 4. Congolese Cobalt mining communities and Ghanaian e-waste scrapyards and dumps. Source: Authors. Such mining techniques pose a severe risk to both the miners hangs over the collective mining properties. Technically companies or themselves and the communities they support. CCR2, who had decades mining cooperatives should water the roads to minimize dust, but they of experience in the cobalt mining industry, stated that: don't. Then you have pollution of fruits and vegetables, other studies looking at urine concentrations at artisanal sites, as well as high rates of Cobalt mining here in all its varieties has massive environmental con- heavy metals in urine and blood, especially children. sequences, and very little attention from government as to what is going on. Those impacts are underestimated, with no comprehensive view. People mainly look at dust and water, and plant contamination. If you Numerous articles have confirmed the depth and extent of en- visit in the dry season, it's like living in a permanent sandstorm, a cloud vironmental pollution associated with cobalt mining, including the exposure of mining teams to uranium and toxic metals (Banza Lubaba 9 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Fig. 5. Artisanal cobalt mines near Kasulu (Kolwezi) and Kawama (Lubumbashi), DRC, 2019. Source: Authors. Fig. 6. Multifaceted externalities with cobalt mining in the DRC. Source: Authors. Nkulu et al. 2018), as well as the pollution of drinking and bathing The cobalt boom has created a social norm that to escape poverty you water with heavy metals (Tsurukawa et al., 2011). The World must mine. The entire community however becomes a mine, people just Bank (2008: 23) called the environmental impacts of ASM in the DRC as start digging, everywhere, under churches and farms, under homes and “deplorable,” and it noted the multifaceted way that such activities can cafes. They know they can earn more money in mining than agriculture, ravage the local environment. This includes direct biodiversity loss and so it diverts resources, and creates more mining. People are proud to have deforestation through mines and disposal sites, as well as air pollution several family members working in mines, you are seen as stupid if you through emissions and discharges. Processing slimes (thick sludge from don't do it, parents are even proud if they have children at mines. Mines mining operations) and tailings damage wetlands and change the flow are not seen as harmful, they are seen as an elevator lifting them out of modification and sedimentation patterns of rivers. Mining tunnels poverty. In reality, however, mining prevents families from diversifying contribute to soil erosion, land instability, and ground subsidence, and their incomes, or creating small businesses, or investing in education or toxic dust coats everything around a mine. Indeed, although the mine is alternatives. It traps them into a life of cobalt. It lures them into a lifestyle only one vector, pollution also occurs across other aspects of the life- that will ultimately kill them. cycle including slurry sites, trading depots, and processing stations. Fig. 6 attempts to visualize the multiple externalities associated with This complex social norm in favor of mining likely explains why cobalt mining. more communities do not reject mining activities. These factors culminate in a toxic environment. And yet commu- The environmental and health calamities of e-waste in Ghana are nities have become addicted to mining. As CER5 put it: just as stark, given that e-waste contains hazardous and toxic 10 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Fig. 7. Multifaceted externalities with e-waste processing in Ghana. Source: Authors. substances such as lead, mercury, cadmium, and flame retardants community, as Fig. 8 indicates. One study found that, unexpectedly, alongside valuable minerals such as gold or copper. The Ghanaian blood levels for lead were higher in e-waste non-workers (i.e., com- Environmental Protection Agency warns that a host of toxic elements munity residents living nearby) than for that of e-waste workers at reside within e-waste streams, including capacitors containing poly- Agbogbloshie (Amankwaa et al. 2017)—probably because the workers chlorinated biphenyls, gas discharge lamps, batteries, plastics con- are onsite only during shifts, but the community residents live there. taining brominated flame retardants, liquid crystal displays, external Other health monitoring has indicated that polychlorinated biphenyls electric cables and electrolyte capacitors. These often also contain as- exposure of people living in Accra not involved in e-waste activities were bestos, mercury, refractory ceramic fibers, and radioactive substances higher than those directly involved (Wittsiepe et al. 2015; (see Fig. 7) (Ghanaian Environmental Protection Agency 2018). Sovacool 2019b). These health dynamics pose a distinct moral hazard In particular, the practices used in battery disposal and recycling are to e-waste activity because they engender undue burdens on those who extremely hazardous. At Agbogbloshie, batteries from electric vehicles have nothing to do with its processing, and do not necessarily consent and other devices are subject to uncontrolled acid drainage, as well as to being involved or polluted. hazardous methods for breaking batteries with machetes Most worryingly, as in the DRC and mining, such health risks are (Atiemo et al. 2016; Sovacool 2019b). Insufficient dust-control mea- tacitly accepted as “worth it” and necessary to climb to a higher stan- sures exist in recycling and smelting facilities, with broken and uneven dard of living. GER 4 explained that: ground-cover that prohibits disassembly and cleaning, nonexistent It [Agbogbloshie] is a huge market for a population otherwise with no washing of secondary plastics resulting in cross-contamination with means of survival in the urban environment. These people, they are not lead-oxide, insufficient personal protective equipment for workers, and stupid, they know the health risks, but they think: isn't dying slowly better the complete absence of health and safety monitoring for workers and than already dead? neighboring communities (Atiemo et al. 2016). GER4 linked these environmental impacts to the health of the local Such a statement implies that better information and education, by population: “when one assesses the determinants of health, many illnesses itself, will do little to minimize hazardous e-waste activities because have environmental causes. Mortality is due to one's neighborhood en- many community members already understand a degree of the risks vironment, where they live before death, and it is here where e-waste acts as involved and see them as tolerable. one of the most potent sources of morbidity.” GER4 went on to explain that: 4.2. Gender disempowerment and the marginalization of women At Agbogbloshie, they use only the most rudimentary means of e-waste A second area of vulnerability relates to marginalization and dis- processing, such as acid leaching, manual dismantling, and burning, empowerment of women, as well as the entrenchment of patterns of which creates serious health problems among the workers themselves. patriarchy and gender inequalities. However, children are also vulnerable. Young children live or attend In the DRC, respondents argued that women were legally forbidden schools close to the site that have many heavy metals in their urine. to mine—it was believed by many experts to be illegal under the Children between ages 12 and 15 already have kidney failure, body National Mining Code, although this fact was contested in the litera- systems like 90 year old adults. Pregnant women are also vulnerable, ture. In reality women often do mine, performing some of the most with linkages to cancer and birth defects emerging. difficult or intensive tasks for less pay than men. As CER8 explained: Environmental impacts are worsened because those working in the Cobalt mining activities are very gendered: For example, you rarely find sector do not have access to, or follow, environmental standards. As women going into the pits and digging, but they play a central role in GCR1 explained, “communities have tried to give hand gloves and protective cleaning, processing, transporting, and trading. Prostitution is rife in clothing, but they tend not to use them, just resell.” mining camps, and sex workers are among the most vulnerable to pov- Worsening matters, the sites at the scrapyard where acid leeching, erty, and also violence, in particular because they are often internal burning, and dismantling take place are located adjacent to a series of migrants with few local connections or support networks. food markets, and some of the scrap itself is recycled into cooking pots and kettles, which respondents argued then further release toxics into CER20 argued that women generally “don't get access to the best food. Moreover, smoke from the burning of waste blankets the entire mining sites” and that even when they do find sites they can mine, “they 11 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Fig. 8. Smoke and dust from e-waste processing at Agbogbloshie adjacent to markets for onions, tomatoes, and vegetables. Source: Authors. don't get paid equal revenue, they don't have the physical strength of men, broadly that Congolese women constituted a growing proportion of they fall sick more often or are more easily harmed.” miners and workers but, due to their low status, were generally forced The site visits confirmed these findings, with dozens of women (and to undertake the most strenuous or poorly paid activities, or become girls) observed digging for cobalt, carrying and sorting the minerals, involved in mining under pressure from their husbands or families. and conducting support activities such as selling vegetables to miners The literature also notes a collection of other indirect effects of ASM and hauling water. The World Bank (2007) noted across the ASM sector mining on gender relations that aggravate gender inequality. 12 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Fig. 9. Women preparing fruits or selling snacks for e-waste burners and collectors at Agbogbloshie, 2019. Source: Authors. Hinton et al. (2013) argue that many of the health impacts from mining blood (Asamoah et al. 2018) as well as very high rates of endocrine are gendered, with women facing specific illness, injury, and stress as disruption and neurotoxicity (Frazzoli et al. 2010; Daum et al. 2017), in well as extreme exertion and exhaustion from very labor-intensive ac- addition to abnormally high rates of spontaneous abortions, stillbirths, tivities (i.e., digging for several hours, hauling heavy loads long dis- and premature births (Grant and Oteng-Ababio 2012). It also falls on tances, bending over in awkward positions). Moreover, women in women, as GER3 noted, to continue to “care for children, manage a mining communities in the DRC, especially sex workers, face the ever household, and assist their husbands, or parents, all the while conducting present risk of contracting dangerous contagious diseases being spread ancillary e-waste activities, all without pay.” by miners, many of them migrants, including HIV/AIDS, diarrhea, he- patitis, meningitis, cholera, typhoid, tetanus, typhus, malaria, yellow 4.3. Child labor and exploitation fever, and tuberculosis (Tsurukawa et al., 2011). These health risks are gendered because women are more likely than men to be prostitutes, A third disturbing finding is that both cobalt mining and e-waste and also given they are at the lower rungs of the mining hierarchy, processing depend significantly on child labor. women are more exposed to unsafe conditions and chronic injuries. In the DRC, children work extensively in the cobalt mining sector Women's gendered and centrally-important roles at Agbogbloshie due to the absence of available schooling, and/or the need to support also expose them to additional risks. GER10 noted that “women are siblings or themselves (as many are orphans). CER2 remarked that exposed to all of the same toxins and risks as men, but are forbidden by “children are in artisanal cobalt mines as the only way to feed themselves or culture to actually do the sorting or burning—instead they do menial tasks their family.” The International Labor Organization (ILO) classifies child such as selling water or cooking food.” Fig. 9 shows two women onsite mining for cobalt as one of the “worst forms of child labor” preparing fruits or selling snacks. As a consequence, mothers within (Amnesty International 2016), since it exposes children to physical and Agbogbloshie have been shown to have high levels of PCBs in their at times psychological and sexual abuse; requires working 13 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 that I can send money to my sisters and my mother. Sometimes, at night, I will sneak into the concession to look for copper, cobalt, and malachite, though I need to watch out for the dogs and the guards. I make about $0.50 a day.” CCR6, another young miner, told the authors he was an “or- phan” and that he “mines cobalt with a shovel to support three younger siblings.” Fig. 10 shows one young miner covered in mud after leaving a tunnel to wash cobalt. These young miners are not exceptions. CER8 estimated that “child labor is practiced extensively.” Based on surveys in 150 mining commu- nities in the Katanga region of the DRC, Faber et al. (2017) estimated that about 23% of children worked in the cobalt mining sector. A re- search team from BGR (2019) also visited 58 copper and cobalt mines in the DRC, and they detected the presence of children at 17 mines (or 29%). In 11 of these mines, children carried out fairly heavy labor in- cluding handpicking, washing, sorting ore, and working underground. Only in 8 of these mines were parents of the children present. Similar conditions can be found in Agbogbloshie, Ghana, with children making up a large proportion of the labor force working at the site, with some directly working as e-waste collectors, some indirectly supporting the waste workers by selling food or providing services, and others merely residing there. GCR1, an expert on e-waste, explained that: Today, the e-waste problem's getting bigger and bigger by the day, which means the future is very bleak for the children of Agbogbloshie. Second hand electronic material continues to be dumped in the area too, from around the world … I encounter children sleeping on scrap, eating with e- waste, coughing intensely, bleeding. I am not a health professional, but I can tell they are dying. GCR16, a dismantler of e-waste, told the authors he had been working at Agbogbloshie for two years. He started working when he was twelve; he has no family, so he spends all his earnings on himself. He stated that “copper from e-waste is my livelihood. I like what I do, it was better than working in the fields in a farm or selling water at the side of the road. I get skills. I get respect. I can make $100 a month, compared to other things, and live like a king.” GCR17, a burner, also stated that he was 14 Fig. 10. Child labor at the Kasulu artisanal cobalt mine in the DRC. Source: (though he looked much younger), and that he had been working there Authors. for five years, meaning he started as a scavenger when he was 9. He gave a different assessment of his livelihood: “No, I don't like my job. underground, underwater, at dangerous heights, or in confined spaces; Who would like this? But, it keeps my family fed, and that is what matters.” involves dangerous equipment and tools as well as the manual handling There is even a football pitch inside the scrapyard and little boys and of heavy loads; places children in unhealthy work environments that girls are known to work alongside collectors and burners. During the expose children to toxic substances, agents, and processes; and it ne- repeated site visits, more than 100 children were observed, including cessitates difficult conditions including working for long hours or at the one in Fig. 11 who is dismantling a television set and desktop night. computer. Children are required to routinely carry sacks of ore that weigh more than they do. Respondents reported that children are also often 4.4. Subjugation of ethnic and migrant minorities exposed to physical abuse and beatings, whippings, and attempted drownings from security guards, as well as drug abuse, violence, and A final concern is how cobalt mining and e-waste processing further sexual exploitation. Some children are reportedly exploited financially worsen ethnic inequalities and exacerbate the marginalization of par- by traders and bosses who refuse to even weigh their products, instead ticular ethnic groups and refugees. paying them substandard (and below market) rates for sacks of cobalt In the DRC, millions of people have had to survive two civil wars, based on visually (under)estimated weights. CER3, an expert on repeated invasions by foreign armies, epidemics of diseases such as mining, explained that: cholera, malaria, HIV/AIDS and Ebola, militia activity, and ethnic conflict. The United Nations Human Rights Commission (2019) projects The cobalt mining sector is littered with children. And these child miners that the DRC is home to 4.5 million displaced persons and more than are in such bad shape that many will die before they ever become an 530,000 refugees. This has collectively created an extremely large po- adult. They will get buried alive in an underground tunnel, or drowned in pulation of displaced persons and ex-combatants who constitute a a waterlogged pit. In the slightly longer term, they can even develop surplus labor pool of migratory workers (refugees) (World Bank 2007). cancer, things like pneumonia, malnutrition, or they start dying from Consequently, CER1 argued that migrants and some ethnic groups were AIDS. There is so much prostitution as well, spreading these diseases. the most vulnerable within the mining sector. As they explained: Why do the children do it? They may make twice to three times what they could earn in another job. New miners, often migrants or refugees, find themselves extremely vul- nerable when they start cobalt mining, as they need to learn a new set of skills in a very dangerous environment. There are ethnic dimensions to CCR4, a digger who stated he was fourteen but looked less than ten vulnerability, also, as the system is predicated on displaced persons years old, said that he “works 10 to 14 h a day, when there is daylight, so 14 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Fig. 11. Child labor at the Agbogbloshie Ghana e-waste scrapyard. Source: Authors. working for artisanal mining bosses trying to stay rich and keep others, During the site visits, it was the newer arrivals from the Northern less experienced miners or different ethnic groups, poor as a result. So Provinces of Ghana, or immigrants from Benin and Togo, who were socioeconomic class mixes with ethnicity for vulnerability … Certain seen burning, almost never those from the Southern Provinces or ethnic groups are more psychologically vulnerable, some better off than longer-time residents of Agbogbloshie. Such migrants lack the social others, some have connections with security people (family connections) ties of longtime residents, face language barriers, and are presumably or traders in the family who can give them money. But it is the refugee easier to exploit. The sleeping quarters for new workers also consisted artisanal miners who are physically, financially, and economically at the simply of collections of metal pipes that people collapsed onto, with bottom of the pile. They are hidden and invisible, since extraction is often bricks for an armrest or pillow. Other new arrivals were so marginalized clandestine. they were not permitted to burn, with the “lowest” members of the hierarchy searching through the dump after things were burnt, essen- CER8 affirmed this point when they noted that while cobalt mining tially searching for the scraps of the scraps. practices may not create new inequalities, they worsen already existing inequalities and patterns of discrimination, saying “I would say that those most exposed to exploitative use of labor are those already most 5. Policy implications and recommendations marginalized within Congolese societies - for example, marginalized com- munities such as the pygmies, not usually employed in mining but displaced The preceding analysis highlights four injustices manifest in the by it. The inequalities in terms of work conditions map onto and reinforce extraction and disposal of low carbon technologies in the DRC and existing inequalities of ethnicity, race, class, and social status.” Ghana: deteriorating environmental health, enhanced gender inequal- Furthermore, the precarious legality of ASM cobalt mining was said ities, child exploitation, and ethnic or religious discrimination. Yet all by several of our respondents to subject mining teams to discrimination too often these upstream and downstream impacts are ignored in policy by foreign firms, mining bosses, local trading companies, the mining discussions which focus narrowly on the expected “emissions gains” of police, the local police, and the national secret service. Multiple miners expansions in, and diffusions of, low carbon technologies. As CER9 discussed being taken advantage of by either the bosses they worked argued, “minerals are such a critical and necessary component of low- for, the companies they sold cobalt to, or LSM operations that artifi- carbon transitions but are oddly invisible to most policymakers or con- cially depressed the price of cobalt. These findings were confirmed by sumers. Awareness of this entire topic is lacking.” GER8 added that “issues Sovacool (2019a). of e-waste are some of the lowest on the policy agenda, especially when Similar patterns of ethnic discrimination occur at Agbogbloshie. compared to more visible waste flows of say plastics or human waste.” There, migratory workers to the site are also given the worst jobs ac- In addition to being invisible, such risks are often interlinked. CCR3 cording to their religion or ethnicity. GER7 states that “new e-waste suggested as much when they noted that: workers are extremely exposed … when they arrive, they are placed at the bottom of the scrapyard hierarchy and are given the most toxic jobs, such as The most vulnerable [to the impacts of mining], the poor and polluted, burning.” GCR12, who oversaw many aspects of management at the can be broken into three categories: workers, children, women. Indeed, I scrapyard, noted that the sheer growth in e-waste has attracted large have seen studies of congenital defects, the risk of being born with a risk numbers of refugees and migrants, who have flocked there for the defect is higher if your father has a mining related job. The health of employment opportunities, saying: communities is under siege due to cobalt mining. The size of operations at Agbogbloshie has doubled in the past 10 years. Such interconnected risks, which cut across our categories of health, We have seen this in a doubling of the volume of waste being handled, the gender, child labor, and ethnic division, demand holistic policy inter- waste being stockpiled and repaired. We see this in the tripling of the ventions as a response. people now living here, as well as the revenues we generate. But we have Thus, as well as identifying vulnerabilities, injustices and inequal- also seen this in the number of different ethnic groups—we had fewer ities, we also asked expert respondents and community participants than 6 ten years ago, but now have almost 20. what reforms and policy changes need to occur to make cobalt mining and e-waste processing more sustainable. All in all, our respondents 15 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Table 5 Holistic policy recommendations from interview respondents to improve the sustainability of cobalt mining and e-waste processing. Source: Authors, based on the expert and community research interviews. Note: ASM=artisanal and small scale mining. LSM=industrial and large-scale mining. OECD = Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development. SAEMAPE = Service d’Assistance et d’Encadrement de l’exploitation artisanal à Petit Echelle Scale Illustrative stakeholders Policy recommendations DRC Ghana Supra-regional and European Union, United Nations, OECD, firms in 1. Pursue broader and more robust 4. Establish better inventories and data repositories global the global cobalt supply chain, firms making and community benefit sharing agreements for tracking and monitoring waste flows exporting electronics equipment 2. Recognize the limitations of 5. Force e-waste exporters to better sort and separate traceability schemes and formalization waste flows 3. Appreciate the necessity of ASM 6. Encourage upcycling and the right to repair to cobalt mining for community livelihood minimize e-waste flows 7. Implement stronger reverse logistics and extended producer responsibility policies 8. Tackle e-waste as part of an integrated waste management program (which would also include plastic waste, organic waste, etc.) National and regional Government bodies such as the Ministry of Mines 9. Enforce better occupational 12. Undertake improved customs screening and in the DRC, or the Ministry of Trade and Industry, standards for ASM mines classification of imported waste flows Ministry of Gender, Child and Social Protection, 10. Form joint ventures between ASM 13. Implement enhanced waste sorting and separation Environmental Protection Agency or Ministry of and LSM interests of wastes streams Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation 11. Implement better dust and tailings 14. Increase financing flows and levy more in Ghana, municipal authorities such as mining management at LSM mines substantial charges on e-waste cooperatives in the DRC, or the Accra 15. Formalize some e-waste activities and build more Metropolitan Assembly recycling centers 16. Complement any such formalization with poverty reduction programs and a respect for the informal e- waste sector Local and community Community groups such as artisanal miners, 17. Support training for alternative 19. Offer targeted medical and health care to mining cooperatives, e-waste workers, residents, livelihoods and awareness of health Agbogbloshie residents associations such as SAEMAPE in the DRC, or the risks Greater Accra Scrap Dealers Association and the 18. Implement gender sensitivity and 20. Introduce education about e-waste and waste Scrap Dealers Association at Agbogbloshie child protection educational programs sorting in schools 21. Facilitate community involvement and ownership 22. Incentivize stakeholder input into data collection 23. Create better training programs for e-waste sorting and dismantling, as well as gender relations and child protection 24. Provide protective gear and equipment to e-waste workers identified 24 distinct recommendations, summarized in Table 5 and suggested a much broader array of options that extend beyond ethical organized across supra-regional and global, national and regional, and minerals, certification schemes, and formalization. local and community scales. This list shows only the policy options Within the DRC, for example, our respondents discussed how better mentioned in multiple interviews (and are thus interpreted to be more environmental management and reclamation at LSM mines would im- credible and feasible). prove community health, and broader and more robust community This laundry list of policies goes well beyond single options such as benefit sharing agreements would ensure the Congolese themselves “ethical minerals” (Hilson et al., 2016) and attempts at improving the benefit more directly from mining. Mining communities could diversify traceability of cobalt supplies. Such efforts include ERG's “Clean Cobalt away from mining to support training for alternative livelihoods, or Initiative,” First Cobalt's “Responsible Cobalt Initiative,” RCS Global's share a broader set of benefits with a more diverse group of stake- “Better Cobalt” program, and the World Economic Forum's “Global holders. For example, Canada already utilizes Impact-Benefit Battery Alliance.” However, CER6 warned that: Agreements, or IBAs, to ensure that communities surrounding mining projects benefit directly and/or are compensated for negative impacts if My worry is due diligence with supply chains via mining companies and they occur (O'Reilly and Eacott 1999–2000). electronics companies will become a technocratic tick the box exercise, Within Ghana, better data collection and sorting of e-wastes could putting a tag saying this is clean cobalt. But that won't really benefit the help separate streams and track flows. Interviewees suggested that local Congolese, it won't improve incomes for miners, nor will it lead to training programs and educational platforms could minimize environ- better labor conditions. mental hazards and promote more awareness about gender equality and Similar global efforts such as the Global Mining Initiative, the child protection. Improved recycling programs, including sufficient Mines, Minerals and Sustainable Development Initiative, and the enforcement and monitoring, for e-waste in Europe and North America Bettercoal initiative have been criticized as “greenwash” and Public would ensure less waste is exported, and that manufacturers (and Relations exercises that didn't improve the ecological and social con- consumers) in those countries focus more on repairing and proper ditions for affected communities (Corpuz and Kennedy 2001; disposal under Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive Nostromo Research 2002; Whitmore 2006; Dashwood 2012; Brock and guidelines, currently operating in the European Union. Dunlap 2018), largely because they failed to address underlying causes such as poverty, inequality, or environmental degradation. 6. Conclusion In parallel, much attention in the literature has emphasized priva- tization, financing and formalization as a solution to “informal” or This article has shown how ongoing transitions to low-carbon so- “illegal” activities such as ASM (Hilson et al., 2017; Hinton et al., 2003) cieties are being underwritten by serious (but rarely acknowledged) or e-waste processing (Atiemo et al. 2016). Our data, however, social and ecological injustices at opposite ends of the supply chain – at 16 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 the artisanal mines providing cobalt from the Democratic Republic of When put into context of calls for a “just transition” (Heffron and the Congo (DRC), and at the facilities handling streams of electronic McCauley 2018), this energy justice focus significantly expands the waste in Ghana. Indeed, as our results show, without careful attention scope of what a “just transition” is or should be. A “just transition,” low-carbon transitions may be paradoxically contributing to environ- when guided by more multi-scalar and reflective energy justice ap- mental destruction, air pollution, contamination of water, and the proaches, would consider well beyond the lost coal mining jobs in health risk of cancer and birth defects. They can deepen existing gender Germany or disrupted energy markets in the United States to the formal inequalities. They depend on the exploitation of children, some of and informal labor segments of Africa (and beyond), many of them low- whom are exposed to extreme risks of death and injury while mining for wage, less organized, and highly at risk. Just transitions research, as cobalt, drowned in waterlogged pits, or worked to death in the e-waste Eicke et al. (2019) put it, must become more globally aware and at- scrapyards of Ghana. Low carbon transitions are also worsening the tempt to minimize transnational unevenness. For perversely, the more subjugation and exploitation of ethnic minorities and refugees. global society currently decarbonizes under this model of a divide, the Perversely, in both cases, the dispossessed communities of Congolese more aggravated and vulnerable particular communities become, the cobalt mining and e-waste processing in Ghana come to rely or depend more local health deteriorates, the more women are marginalized, the on the very activities that are harming them. more children are enslaved, the more minorities are subjugated. One core conclusion is that patterns of injustice and domination are Thirdly, low-carbon transitions are not just about climate change or embedded in existing processes of decarbonisation, in spite of the as- carbon emissions. Given that these transitions are in motion within a sumption that low carbon trajectories represent a more just way of capitalist, materialist, and overly unequal world-system that is struc- producing energy. While decarbonisation may thus contribute to tured by existing inequalities between and within societies, dec- cleaner air and cleaner production in the Global North, much of the arbonisation can clearly entrench particular power relations, mirror environmental and social harm is simply made invisible and displaced, and circulate patterns of ethnic or gender prejudice, or exacerbate po- or spatially externalized, to the Global South. We term this phenom- litical powerlessness and peripheralisation. Even though cobalt mining enon the “decarbonisation divide,” and that divide is simultaneously and e-waste scrapyards may be necessary parts of the global economy, conceptual or epistemic, geographic, environmental, and develop- the spaces within which decarbonisation operates require complex and mental. Conceptually, it reflects an epistemic divide in that much re- adaptive management, one that must recognize and remediate land- search in the North focuses on the diffusion and use of decarbonisation scapes of toxicity, gender relations, patterns of child labor, and dis- technology and systems, but ignores harmful impacts and the re- crimination. The academic community in particular needs to continue production of inequalities in other parts of the lifecycle (upstream, developing more multi-scalar, multi-level understandings of such downstream) in the South. The term captures a geographic divide in transitions and their processes which cut across geographic space that those impacts are split literally and unevenly across space by (Europe, North America, and Africa), categories of creation and de- continents: cleaner technology is deployed in one place (East Asia, struction, and chains of value (upstream, midstream, and downstream). Europe, North America) whereas its manufacturing costs and wastes In laying out these concerns, our intent is not to stop all low-carbon occur in another place (Africa and other parts of the developing world). transitions. To the contrary, we take the urgent need for decarbonisa- It reflects an environmental divide, in that the Northern natural en- tion across the economy including systems of energy provision, mobi- vironment gets cleaner while the Southern environment gets dirtier and lity, agriculture, food, waste, water, and forestry as a given (Brown and even locked into more polluting and at times carbon intensive activities. Sovacool 2011; Geels et al., 2017). Instead, our aim here is to caution The term lastly reflects a relational developmental divide, a process by against complacency in the promotion and analysis of low carbon which some localities are forced into Faustian pacts with other weal- transitions. The study demands that we take a whole systems approach thier and powerful countries or firms in order to attract revenue or to decarbonisation that fully accounts for the suite of social and en- investment, but remain comparatively weak in poverty and perpetual vironmental costs that low-carbon transitions bear on some of the disadvantage. The irony is not only that the Democratic Republic of the poorest, most vulnerable segments of our global society. It questions the Congo and Ghana become “sacrifice zones” (Healy et al., 2019) for low- possibility of decarbonisation and green transitions without structural carbon development under this divide; but also that they will them- changes to the global political economy, trade flows, production and selves become more difficult to decarbonize in the future as they are consumption patterns, and unequal access to resources. In short, true locked into embedded flows of pollution and dependent on the very low-carbon transitions must involve challenging global distribution of processes of dispossession that victimize them. power and become more accountable, equitable and just (Scoones et al., Secondly, we must resist the temptation to only examine low-carbon 2015). transitions, and the particular innovations underpinning them, at their Taking these conclusions seriously thus challenges the very idea of point of diffusion, deployment, or use. We need to instead critically conceptualizing renewable energies as sustainable, or – given the con- assess the entire lifecycle or “whole system” of these innovations, from tinued reliance on the mining of finite metals – even as renewable the front end where metals and minerals are extracted, to the back end (Dunlap 2019; Dunlap and Brock 2020). The policy community in- where waste streams reside. GER7 even cautioned that: centivizing low-carbon pathways, and the engineering community de- signing low-carbon innovations, must no longer ignore or disengage If we fully achieve Sustainable Development Goal 7, and ramp up re- from these concerns. Nor should the research community abstain from newables or universal access to modern energy services, what does that the normative and ethical implications of the sustainability transitions mean for waste systems? We fully introduce hazardous waste from they examine, or rely on analytical constructs or conceptual frame- batteries, digital devices, and solar panels into societies that are used to works that mask the decarbonization divide . For low-carbon transitions biogenic cycles. In rural communities, these communities dispose of can be currently considered as fully sustainable only if we use ex- electronic equipment into latrines. The e-waste dilemma fits into the tremely limited criteria for assessment. material implications of rural electrification and decarbonisation, and it exposes the Global South to increasingly toxic material flows. CRediT authorship contribution statement Such a “whole systems” analytical focus would help address the dissonance that currently exists between the use of low-carbon in- Benjamin K. Sovacool: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal novations to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions in places such as analysis, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Methodology, Project ad- Europe and North America, and the pernicious and persistent con- ministration, Resources, Software, Supervision, Validation, sequences befalling communities in countries such as the DRC and Visualization, Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing. Ghana. Andrew Hook: Validation, Visualization, Writing - original draft, 17 B.K. Sovacool, et al. Global Environmental Change 60 (2020) 102028 Writing - review & editing. Mari Martiskainen: Validation, Daum, Kurt, et al., 2017. Toward a more sustainable trajectory for E-Waste policy: a Visualization, Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing. review of a decade of E-Waste research in Accra, Ghana. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 14, 135. Andrea Brock: Validation, Visualization, Writing - original draft, Dominish, E., Florin, N., Teske, S., 2019. Responsible minerals sourcing for renewable Writing - review & editing. Bruno Turnheim: Validation, Visualization, energy. Report prepared for earthworks by the institute for sustainable futures. Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing. University of Sydney. Dunlap, A., 2018. The ‘solution’ is now the ‘problem:’’ wind energy, colonisation and the ‘genocide-ecocide nexus’ in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, Oaxaca. Int. J. Hum. Rights Declaration of Competing Interest 22 (4), 550–573. Dunlap, A., 2019. Renewing destruction: wind energy development. Conflict and Resistance in a Latin American Context. Rowmand & Littlefield, London and New None of the authors have any formal conflicts of interest to declare. York. Dunlap, A., Brock, A., 2020. When the wolf guards the sheep: confronting the industrial Acknowledgements machine through Green extractivism in Germany and Mexico. Anarchist Political Ecology. Eicke, L., Weko, S., Goldthau, A., 2019. Countering the risk of an uneven low-carbon This project has received funding from the European Union's energy transition. IASS Policy Brief 2019, 8. https://doi.org/10.2312/iass.2019.051. Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agree- Enevoldsen, P., Permien, F.H., Bakhtaoui, I., von Krauland, A.K., Jacobson, M.Z., Xydis, ment No 730403 “Innovation pathways, strategies and policies for the G., Sovacool, B.K., Valentine, S.V., Luecht, D., Oxley, G., 2019. How much wind power potential does Europe have? 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