November 25th, 2025 - Auto Industry Ignored Warnings That Battery Recycling Was Poisoning Communities

At Ford’s headquarters near Detroit in 2005, an Australian lawyer named Phillip Toyne warned executives that recycled car battery lead was poisoning communities around the world. Lead is essential to car batteries but extremely toxic, and as global demand grew, more factories, especially in developing countries, melted down old batteries while releasing dangerous levels of lead into the air. Mr. Toyne proposed a certification system that would label “clean” recycling plants and allow automakers to market themselves as using environmentally responsible suppliers. The idea drew interest but ultimately went nowhere.

A New York Times and Examination investigation later revealed how severely these factories have harmed people, particularly in Africa. Outside Lagos, Nigeria, testing showed that children living near several recycling plants had dangerously high lead levels that could cause permanent brain damage. Most automakers, including Ford, declined to comment on the findings, saying they rely on suppliers to follow the law. Yet records show that companies have known for nearly 30 years that recycling plants in Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania and elsewhere were releasing lead and harming surrounding communities.

Despite this knowledge, the auto and battery industries repeatedly avoided reforms. When drafting their environmental policies, major car companies chose not to include lead, even as their supply chains increasingly relied on low standard recycling operations overseas. Notes from internal meetings show that Ford executives initially liked Mr. Toyne’s “Green Lead” proposal, believing environmentally conscious customers might respond well. But after Ford suffered major financial losses in 2006, and as the industry later battled the global financial crisis, the initiative collapsed.

Industry leaders also resisted efforts to regulate their supply chains. In India, Hero Honda, then the world’s largest motorcycle manufacturer, launched a pilot program to buy batteries only from factories certified as reducing lead emissions. Advocates tried to persuade global carmakers to adopt the model, but none signed on. Major Indian battery manufacturers also refused, and the pilot never expanded beyond a small circle. Meanwhile, recycled lead from poorly regulated factories continued entering international markets, including Japan.

In Mexico, a deadly 2011 recycling disaster pushed U.S. officials to urge stronger global standards. The General Services Administration asked ASTM International to create recycling guidelines, but the world’s largest battery maker at the time, Johnson Controls, organized an overwhelming turnout of industry representatives to vote the proposal down. Without their cooperation, the effort stalled. Johnson Controls later sold its battery division, but the lack of standards persisted.

While car companies have embraced sustainability commitments for other raw materials like cobalt, gold and coltan, they have largely ignored lead. Many automakers list minerals linked to environmental or human rights abuses, yet lead often does not appear on those lists, despite its well documented dangers. Ford’s most recent sustainability report highlights new supply chain transparency goals but makes no mention of lead exposure or responsible sourcing of recycled lead.

Phillip Toyne, who died in 2015, never saw his Green Lead idea take off. His partner on the project later helped design successful certification systems for diamonds and gold, but said lead never gained the same attention. Unlike precious metals, he explained, the dirty reality of lead recycling lacked the public appeal needed to push global companies to act.

Word of the Day (Merriam-Webster) - Perdition (noun, per-DISH-un) - Perdition refers to hell, or to the state of being in hell forever as punishment after death—in other words, damnation. It is usually used figuratively.

Example: Dante’s Inferno details the main character’s journey through perdition.

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