FACT SHEET: Oil and Gas Drilling Harms to People
Last updated: April 20, 2023
- More than 2.7 million Californians live within 3,200 feet of an operational oil and gas well. 69% are people of color (including Hispanic or Latino), 5.9% are children under 5 years of age and 21.4% are children under 18 years of age. A total of 7.4 million live within one mile. That’s 18.6% of Californians.
- The state of California needs to recognize that the impacted communities are paying an enormous amount with their health and well-being so oil and gas companies can extract oil and gas for profit. The impacted communities are directly subsidizing the oil and gas companies, and thereby the end users of the oil and gas extracted. The state should not continue to make the impacted communities subsidize oil and gas produced in California.
- Oil and gas well production within 2.5 miles of California communities exposes people to levels of air pollutants linked to asthma, cancer, cardiovascular diseases, preterm birth, and other long-term health defects, according to a study published in the journal Science of The Total Environment, so a buffer zone of 3,200 feet is the least that the state can do.
- Over the last 15 years, Black and Latino Californians, renters, the linguistically isolated, or low-income residents persistently had disproportionately high exposure to oil and gas wells, living within 1 kilometer, or 3,280 feet, of wells, according to a UC Berkeley study. The widest observed disparities were for Black people residing in neighborhoods with the most intensive oil and gas production. Disparities in exposure to oil and gas development may contribute to previously reported health disparities.
- California is the only major oil-producing state with no minimum setback distance between wells and homes, schools or other sensitive receptors, despite the grave health harms from oil and gas pollution. Other oil-producing states including Texas, Colorado, and Pennsylvania, have mandated boundaries between communities and wells.
- Urban communities near oil wells experience reduced lung function and wheezing, and in some cases the respiratory damage rivals that of daily exposure to secondhand smoke or living beside a freeway, according to a study published in the journal Environmental Research.
- Pregnant women living near oil and gas wells in California face a high risk of preterm birth, the leading cause of infant death in the United States. Stanford’s research shows that risks were highest for Hispanic and African American women.
- Pregnant mothers living in rural locations within six tenths of a mile of the highest-producing oil wells in the state were 40% more likely to give birth to low weight babies and 20% more likely to have babies small for their gestational ages than people living further away, according to Berkeley’s School of Public Health.
- Children are more susceptible to damage from toxins because their bodies are smaller and still developing. Low levels of chemical and air toxin exposure over long periods of time can significantly damage childhood development and increase the risk of chronic diseases like cancer and asthma.
- Across the LA Basin, oil companies have reported repeated use of 12 notorious air toxins during extraction and production that expose vulnerable nearby communities to a host of chronic conditions, respiratory illnesses, cancer risk, damage to the nervous system, cardiovascular disease, and reproductive and endocrine disruption. Under an SCAQMD rule, oil companies are allowed to keep the identity of some of the chemicals hidden from the public if they claim it is a “trade secret.”
- Oil companies bring tens of thousands of gallons of toxic chemicals into Wilmington neighborhoods next to the third largest U.S. oil field. Heavy diesel equipment and trucks increase the release of diesel exhaust, a dangerous contributor to cancer and asthma. The chemicals shipped and stored on drilling sites are highly flammable and known to cause cancer asthma and can harm fertility and the unborn.
- Improving the mortality of Californians living within half a mile of an oil well by decreasing their exposure to fine particulate matter of 2.5 microns in diameter would provide social benefits of more than $382.5 million annually. These social benefits include reduced health care costs, extended lifespans, increased productivity, and the decreased cost of long-term care for low birth weight or preterm births.
- Coronavirus patients exposed to high levels of air pollution before the pandemic hit are more likely to die from the infection than patients in cleaner parts of the country, according to a nationwide Harvard study that offered the first clear link between long-term exposure to pollution and Covid 19. That would include California communities living with oil and gas drilling operations.
- Air pollution from oil and gas production contributes to thousands of early deaths and childhood asthma cases nationwide. Totaling $77 billion in annual health costs, fossil fuel pollution affected communities in states with high oil and gas production, as well as states with limited or no gas activity, underlining the need for comprehensive regulatory action to protect Americans from the pollutants generated by this sector.
