The Daily Mail in the UK published an article several years ago linking the Prius to environmental damage from nickel smelting at Sudbury, Ontario. Needless to say (I think), they were smelting nickel ore at Sudbury a century before the Prius was developed, and the vast bulk of it goes to the steel industry.

Here's an excerpt from the story, followed by a link to their retraction, posted after readers pointed out their distortion of the truth:

Toyota factory turns landscape to arid wilderness
By MARTIN DELGADO, Mail on Sunday - More by this author » Last updated at 22:36pm on 18th November 2006

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The 'green-living' Toyota Prius has become the ultimate statement for those seeking to stress their commitment to the environment.

However, the environment-saving credentials of the cars are seriously undermined by the disclosure that one of the car's essential components is produced at a factory that has created devastation likened to the arid environment of the moon.

So many plants and trees around the factory at Sudbury in Ontario, Canada, have died that astronauts from Nasa practised driving moon buggies on the outskirts of the city because it was considered the closest thing on earth to the rocky lunar landscape.

The retraction: Toyota factory | Mail Online