🔗 Share this article

One-fourth of the world's people resides less than 5km of operational oil, gas, and coal facilities, likely endangering the health of exceeding 2bn human beings as well as vital environmental systems, per groundbreaking analysis.

Global Presence of Fossil Fuel Infrastructure

In excess of 18,300 petroleum, gas, and coal mining locations are presently distributed across over 170 nations globally, taking up a vast territory of the world's terrain.

Nearness to extraction sites, refineries, conduits, and other oil and gas installations increases the threat of cancer, breathing ailments, heart disease, early delivery, and fatality, while also creating severe threats to water supplies and air cleanliness, and damaging soil.

Immediate Vicinity Dangers and Planned Expansion

Almost over 460 million residents, encompassing over 120 million children, presently reside within one kilometer of oil and gas operations, while an additional 3.5k or so proposed sites are presently proposed or being built that could compel over 130 million more individuals to face emissions, flares, and spills.

Nearly all active projects have created pollution hotspots, transforming adjacent neighborhoods and essential ecosystems into referred to as disposable areas – heavily contaminated zones where poor and marginalized populations bear the disproportionate burden of proximity to contaminants.

Physical and Environmental Consequences

The study details the severe physical consequences from mining, treatment, and transportation, as well as showing how leaks, burning, and construction damage unique environmental habitats and compromise individual rights – notably of those living close to oil, gas, and coal facilities.

The report emerges as world leaders, not including the USA – the largest past source of carbon emissions – meet in Belem, Brazil, for the thirtieth global climate conference in the context of rising disappointment at the limited movement in eliminating fossil fuels, which are causing environmental breakdown and human rights violations.

"Coal and petroleum corporations and their state sponsors have argued for many years that economic growth depends on coal, oil, and gas. But we know that under the guise of prosperity, they have in fact served self-interest and profits unchecked, infringed rights with almost total impunity, and destroyed the climate, ecosystems, and oceans."

Climate Talks and Global Pressure

The environmental summit occurs as the Philippines, the North American country, and Jamaica are suffering from superstorms that were worsened by increased air and sea heat levels, with countries under growing demand to take firm action to regulate coal and gas corporations and halt mining, financial support, authorizations, and demand in order to comply with a significant judgment by the world court.

Last week, reports indicated how over over 5.3k coal and petroleum advocates have been given admission to the United Nations environmental negotiations in the last several years, blocking climate action while their employers drill for record quantities of oil and gas.

Analysis Methodology and Data

This data-driven analysis is derived from a groundbreaking mapping exercise by researchers who compared records on the documented sites of oil and gas operations sites with demographic figures, and records on essential habitats, carbon emissions, and Indigenous peoples' areas.

33% of all functioning oil, coal, and natural gas sites overlap with multiple key habitats such as a swamp, woodland, or waterway that is rich in species diversity and important for emission storage or where ecological decline or disaster could lead to habitat destruction.

The real global scale is likely higher due to gaps in the documentation of coal and gas operations and restricted census data across countries.

Natural Inequality and Native Populations

The findings demonstrate deep-seated environmental injustice and bias in exposure to oil, gas, and coal sectors.

Tribal populations, who account for five percent of the international people, are disproportionately subjected to health-reducing coal and gas infrastructure, with one in six locations located on tribal lands.

"We face intergenerational struggle exhaustion … We physically cannot endure [this]. We were never the starters but we have borne the impact of all the conflict."

The spread of fossil fuels has also been associated with land grabs, heritage destruction, community division, and economic hardship, as well as violence, online threats, and court cases, both criminal and legal, against local representatives calmly opposing the construction of conduits, extraction operations, and other infrastructure.

"We do not pursue wealth; we just desire {what