Electric shock US car culture must change, warns report

The US's transition to electric vehicles could require three times as much lithium as is currently produced for the entire global market, causing needless water shortages, Indigenous land grabs and ecosystem destruction, new research finds.

- By Nina Lakhani

It warns that unless the US's dependence on cars in towns and cities falls drastically, the transition to lithium battery-powered electric vehicles by 2050 will deepen global environmental and social inequalities linked to mining - and may even jeopardise the 1.5C global heating target.

But ambitious policies investing in mass transit, walkable towns and cities and robust battery recycling would slash the amount of extra lithium required in 2050 by more than 90%.

The research by the Climate and Community Project and University of California, Davis, comes at a critical juncture with the rollout of funding for electric vehicles through Joe Biden's Inflation Reduction and Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Acts.