The Global Race to Mine the Metal of the Future

In the high-stakes competition to dominate the business of clean energy, the Democratic Republic of Congo is a major arena: The country is the source of more than two-thirds of the world’s cobalt, a key component of electric-car batteries.

In recent years, China has established a strong presence in Congo, while the United States has lost ground. We went to the African country to understand how that happened.

Guest: Dionne Searcey, a correspondent for The New York Times.

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Background reading: 

The United States failed to safeguard decades of diplomatic and financial investments in Congo, where the world’s largest supply of cobalt is now controlled by Chinese companies backed by Beijing.The power struggle over Congo’s cobalt has rattled the clean-energy revolution.

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