Beyond the Oil Age | Mining

From smartphones to aircraft engines and electric car batteries, cobalt is a critical component of modern life as the metal protects batteries from overheating and fire, extending their lifespan. As demand for cobalt has soared in recent decades, it has been the Democratic Republic of Congo, which holds most of Earth’s cobalt reserves, that has borne the brunt. The Central African country has seen an expansion of industrial-scale mines that extract this metal. But this has led to forced evictions and human rights violations, as well as devastating climate implications. Mines – both legal and illegal – have appeared across the country and threaten the pristine rainforest.

The film Beyond the Oil Age investigates a modern world trying to move to greener, cleaner energy at the expense of countries like the DRC. The miracle metal cobalt, a superalloy, is now turning into a deadly chemical as dumping of toxic substances has devastated landscapes, polluted water and contaminated crops. The search for DRC’s cobalt has demonstrated how the clean energy revolution, aimed at saving the planet from dangerously rising temperatures, is trapped in a familiar cycle of environmental degradation, exploitation and greed.