In a July 18 tweet, Brian Gitt called attention to the link between lithium batteries for electric vehicles and Chinese slave labor.
He references a Bloomberg article about a battery supplier for Tesla and BMW prospecting in tandem with Chinese Communist Party-backed companies in regions tied to slave labor.
"A lithium producer crucial for global automakers, like Tesla, plans to explore for metals in a Chinese region tied to slave labor," wrote Gitt, who tweets on energy, investing and decision-making.
Ganfeng Lithium Co. is the top Chinese producer of lithium, Bloomberg reported. Company leadership recently visited Xinjiang to discuss working with local government on precious metal mining.
The Xinjiang Police Files were released earlier this year, which verify the global concerns about Uyghur forced labor in Xinjiang and show significant national and local government involvement in the process.
“The risks to the EV sector of inputs coming out of Xinjiang is huge,” Emily de La Bruyere, a cofounder of Horizon Advisory, a U.S.-based consultancy focused on forced labor issues, told Bloomberg. “It places all of China’s battery production at risk of violating U.S. law and global norms around human rights, and that risk is only going to grow as China continues to build up EV-relevant industries in Xinjiang.”