The exploitation of ‘green energy’

OPINION:

Wealth, with no ethical or moral standards for those of lesser means, can be dangerous and fatal to the cheap labor of disposable workforces.

We have seen the effects on the disposable workforce when Qatar “needed” to build seven stadiums in a decade to be ready for the 2022 World Cup. The World Cup in Qatar kicked off on Nov. 20 at Al Bayt Stadium, but the “acceptable” toll of more than 6,500 migrant laborers who died between 2011 and 2020, helping to build World Cup infrastructure with a cheap, disposable workforce, will provide viewers and participants with many lingering questions about our ethical and moral beliefs resulting from the grim toll.

Decades ago, it was sweatshops in the textile industry that grabbed the world’s humanitarian attention. Today it is the green movement, which is dominated by poorer developing countries mining the exotic minerals and metals that support the wealthy countries that are going green at a great cost to humanity. 

The wealthy countries understand that developing countries have virtually no environmental laws or labor laws, which allows those locations unlimited opportunities to exploit people with yellow, brown and black skin and inflict environmental degradation on their landscapes.

Showing no moral or ethical concerns for the disposable workforce, wealthy countries continue to encourage subsidies to procure electric vehicles and build more wind and solar energy infrastructure. Those subsidies are providing financial incentives to the developing countries mining for those green materials to continue their exploitation of poor people and environmental degradation of their landscapes.

The 2021 Pulitzer Prize-nominated book “Clean Energy Exploitations” reveals the lack of transparency regarding the green movement’s impact on humanity. Exploitation is occurring in developing countries that are mining the exotic minerals and metals required to create the batteries needed to store “green energy.” In these developing countries, mining operations exploit child labor and are responsible for egregious human rights violations of vulnerable minority populations. These operations are also directly destroying the planet through environmental degradation.

Last month, President Biden provided validation to the book’s message when his administration declared that batteries from China may be tainted by child labor, a move that could upend the electric vehicle industry while giving fresh ammunition to critics of the White House’s bizarre climate policies.

The Department of Labor said it would add lithium-ion batteries to a list of goods made with materials known to be produced with child or forced labor under a 2006 human trafficking law. The decision was based on many batteries using cobalt, a mineral largely mined in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where children have been found to work at some mining sites. The department released the list in the form of a report that excoriated “clean energy” supply chains for using forced labor. It grouped Chinese batteries together with polysilicon — a key material used in solar panel cells — made in the Chinese province of Xinjiang.

Whatever the plan to satisfy our sports entertainment values and “green” environmental policies, our political leaders best not forget that they have ethical and moral responsibilities to continue to address the quality-of-life needs of those 8 billion on this planet now.

• Rick Amato is a former financial adviser for Merrill Lynch, Amato Wealth Management Group & prime-time national TV host at OAN. Ronald Stein Energy Policy adviser for the Heartland Institute and Pulitzer Prize-nominated author on energy.