Hello and welcome to Power Metal, the newsletter about the race for the resources that are shaping the future! It’s the weekly complement to my book of the same name, which you can order here.
Power Metal is about how the raw materials we need for renewable energy and digital technology are spawning environmental havoc, political upheaval and murder—and how we can do better. This newsletter is a space for updates, insights and analysis about those issues, and for readers (that’s you) to talk to me and each other about it all.
WHY POWER METAL?
Part of the inspiration for this project was buying my first electric car several years back. Once I stopped congratulating myself for being such a good friend of the Earth, it occurred to me that I didn’t really know anything about how that electric car had been built—where the materials had come from, and what damage had been done in the process. That started me down a trail of research and reporting that led to some very disturbing places.
It turns out that computers, cell phones, electric cars, solar panels and wind turbines all share an Achilles heel: manufacturing them requires enormous amounts of often rare metals—lithium, cobalt, copper, and others. That has sparked a global scramble to find new places and new ways to get those materials. As a result, rainforests are being cut to the ground. Rivers are being poisoned. Children are being put to work in mines. Warlords are getting rich. China’s economic power is being strengthened. And untold numbers of people are getting killed.
The goal of Power Metal is to shine a light on that damage, the ways in which it might get worse—and crucially, the ways in which we can reduce that damage. That last angle, I think, is too often missing in media coverage. To make the leap to a world run on the digital technology we already take for granted and the carbon-free power we absolutely require, we need a whole new approach.
WHY THIS NEWSLETTER?
This is an experiment for me. I’ve been a journalist for more than 30 years, specializing in in-depth investigations into overlooked and undercovered issues. My reporting has won all kinds of awards and taken me to 40-plus countries for publications including Wired, The Atlantic, The Guardian, Mother Jones, Rolling Stone, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, and The New York Times.
As you probably know, however, the news business is collapsing. Thousands of journalists have been laid off, and budgets for freelancers like myself are constantly shrinking. Once-mighty titles in print and online have shriveled or disappeared completely. I love my work, and one reason I love it is that I believe independent journalism can make a difference in the world. For years I’ve been able to tell important stories and make a (precarious) living doing it. But the old model of selling stories to established publications just doesn’t work anymore.
So instead, I’m communicating directly with you, the readers. Every Thursday, for starters. My aim is to provide top-notch reporting and analysis on the latest environmental, legal and political struggles sparked by the hunt for the metals we need for the energy transition and digital technology, and about possible solutions, from recycling to reducing our dependence on the automobile. Plus, culture! I’ll throw in a review of a book, film, podcast or suchlike that seems relevant. I’d love to hear your suggestions.
The newsletter is 100% free to keep it accessible to everyone. That said, I do encourage you to pay for a subscription if you can. The many readers who have already done so help make it possible for me to continue doing this work.
Also, if you like what you see, please tell your friends! And please feel free to tell me if you have suggestions or ideas about issues you’d like to see covered here.
Power Metal was written with support from the Canada Council for the Arts, the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, the Dave Greber Freelance Writers Awards, and the Access Copyright Foundation.
