Battery-electric trucks, which run on two 8,000-lb. lithium iron batteries, are far heavier than their clean-diesel counterparts. Since trucks are subject to strict federal weight limits, mandating BEVs will decrease the payload of each truck, putting more of them on the road and increasing both traffic congestion and tailpipe emissions.
To mass produce lithium-ion batters, tens of millions of tons of cobalt, graphite, lithium and nickel will be needed, which could take as long as 35 years to acquire given current levels of global production. Expanding that capacity carries a giant environmental footprint, producing considerably more CO2 and pollution than the manufacture of internal combustible engines. In some operations, a minimum of one million gallons of water are used to produce a single pound of lithium.
Moreover, child and other exploitive labor practices are common in many of the countries that produce these minerals. In the Congo Republic, which exports more than half of the world's total Cobalt, at least 40,000 children are enslaved in the labor trade according to the United Nations.
