The electric car is certainly very clean for use (as long as the electricity used is clean), but that is obviously only part of the story. And if various design offices and press organs have already observed the electric car through its “production” aspect and through its “human rights” aspect, a British study has brought these two aspects together for the first time. And it’s not always pretty pretty.
Medal for Mercedes, dunce cap for the Chine
This study shows that electrical models of Mercedes are the most virtuous, with a score (however not huge) of 37%. In detail, that gives 27% for environmental respect, 46% for human rights. Ford is in second place with 33% (but the highest human rights score, 51%), followed by Volvo with 31%. Except that the brand only wins 24% in human rights, and that’s a first clue. Indeed, remember that Volvo is owned by Chinese giant Geely. Geely, precisely, comes at the bottom of the pack, with an overall score of 6%, tied with Toyota, Come on and Mitsubishi. And that’s not the worst. We note 0%, for example for BYD, a brand whose deployment in Europe is currently well under way. A clarification: this score of 0% is obtained not for observed shortcomings, but because the information necessary for the study was unavailable.