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25% of the world's residents lives within 5km of operational fossil fuel facilities, possibly threatening the physical condition of more than 2 billion human beings as well as vital environmental systems, based on groundbreaking study.

Global Spread of Oil and Gas Sites

More than 18.3k petroleum, gas, and coal mining sites are now distributed in one hundred seventy nations worldwide, covering a vast expanse of the world's land.

Proximity to drilling wells, processing plants, transport lines, and additional coal and gas installations elevates the threat of cancer, lung diseases, cardiac problems, premature birth, and fatality, while also causing serious risks to drinking water and air quality, and damaging soil.

Immediate Vicinity Dangers and Planned Expansion

Approximately half a billion individuals, including over 120 million minors, currently reside within 0.6 miles of coal and gas operations, while a further three thousand five hundred or so upcoming sites are presently planned or under development that could compel over 130 million additional people to endure pollutants, burning, and accidents.

Nearly all functioning operations have established contamination concentrated areas, turning nearby communities and critical environments into so-called sacrifice zones – highly polluted zones where low-income and marginalized communities bear the disproportionate weight of exposure to contaminants.

Physical and Natural Consequences

The report details the severe health impact from mining, refining, and movement, as well as showing how seepages, ignitions, and building harm priceless environmental habitats and undermine civil liberties – particularly of those living near petroleum, gas, and coal facilities.

This occurs as global delegates, excluding the US – the largest historical producer of carbon emissions – assemble in Belem, Brazil, for the 30th climate negotiations in the context of increasing concern at the limited movement in phasing out fossil fuels, which are leading to planetary collapse and human rights violations.

"Oil and gas companies and its state sponsors have maintained for many years that economic growth depends on oil, gas, and coal. But we know that in the name of financial development, they have rather served self-interest and earnings without limits, infringed liberties with almost total impunity, and destroyed the climate, ecosystems, and oceans."

Global Talks and Global Demand

Cop30 is held as the Philippines, Mexico, and Jamaica are suffering from major hurricanes that were intensified by warmer atmospheric and sea heat levels, with nations under increasing demand to take strong steps to oversee fossil fuel firms and halt drilling, subsidies, authorizations, and consumption in order to adhere to a landmark decision by the global judicial body.

In recent days, revelations showed how over 5,350 fossil fuel industry lobbyists have been given admission to the UN global conferences in the past four years, hindering emission reductions while their sponsors extract record volumes of oil and gas.

Analysis Approach and Results

The statistical analysis is derived from a first-of-its-kind geospatial effort by experts who compared records on the documented positions of fossil fuel facilities projects with population information, and records on essential habitats, greenhouse gas emissions, and tribal territories.

A third of all functioning oil, coal, and natural gas locations overlap with several key environments such as a wetland, forest, or waterway that is abundant in biodiversity and vital for CO2 absorption or where natural decline or disaster could lead to environmental breakdown.

The true global extent is probably larger due to deficiencies in the recording of coal and gas operations and limited demographic data across states.

Ecological Inequality and Native Peoples

The results reveal deep-seated environmental injustice and bias in proximity to petroleum, natural gas, and coal mining operations.

Native communities, who account for one in twenty of the world's people, are unfairly subjected to health-reducing oil and gas infrastructure, with one in six facilities situated on tribal lands.

"We're experiencing long-term resistance weariness … We literally won't survive [this]. We are not the initiators but we have taken the impact of all the aggression."

The growth of coal, oil, and gas has also been connected with territorial takeovers, heritage destruction, population conflict, and income reduction, as well as violence, internet intimidation, and lawsuits, both illegal and legal, against community leaders peacefully challenging the development of transport lines, mining sites, and additional infrastructure.

"We never pursue wealth; we only want {what