“Fossil fuels will kill us,” warn high -ranking researchers

In terms of clarity, the scientists involved hardly miss it: In a warning, eleven of leading researchers published today as urgently as rarely that fossil fuels such as petroleum and natural gas endanger the future of humanity.

“Science cannot be clearer,” says Shaye Wolf, head of climate science at the Center for Biological Diversity and the main author of the report: “Fossil fuels are killing us. Oil, gas and coal will continue to be more death, to extend animals and to extreme weather disasters if we do not ensure that dirty fuels belong to the past. Energy is there, it is affordable and it will save millions of human life and trillions of dollars as soon as we make her the heart of our economy. ”

The report summarizes the scientific findings that show that fossil fuels not only cause the climate crisis, but also health damage, the loss of biodiversity and pollution from plastics and agrochemicals.

The scientists are particularly targeting the USA, the world’s largest oil and gas producers and the main cause of the crisis in fossil fuels.

Fossil fuels are responsible for around 90 percent of the carbon dioxide emissions caused by humans, which heat up the climate, let the oceans acidify and lead to unprecedented climate catastrophes. The air pollution caused by the combustion of fossil fuels is responsible every year for millions of early deaths worldwide and hundreds of thousands of early deaths in the United States alone. The climate crisis causes additional deaths as well as physical and mental health damage due to escalating climate catastrophes, the transmission of diseases, nutritional uncertainty and the displacement of people.

On the basis of their knowledge and decades of research, the authors ask the governments to stop the expansion of the fossil fuels immediately and to expire the expansion of existing fossil fuels in order to limit the damage caused by the climate crisis.

“The pollution caused by fossil fuels affects health in every phase of life and carries an increased risk of diseases that range from premature births to leukemia in childhood to serious depression,” said co -author David JX González, assistant professor for environmental health sciences at UC Berkeley School of Public Health. “We have to act quickly to end fossil fuels near our houses, schools and hospitals and exchange the infrastructure for fossil fuels for healthy, clean energy.”

Fossil fuels harm all people, but according to the report, the funding, processing and use of fossil fuels for colored and low -income population groups is disproportionately harmful.

“Decades of discriminatory policies such as the so -called Redlining have concentrated the development of fossil fuels on black, brown, indigenous and poor white communities, which has devastating consequences,” said Robin Saha, extraordinary professor at the University of Montana.

The term “redlining” has become an abbreviation for many types of racist exclusion tactics in the real estate sector. The rediting originally goes back to the time of the 1930s, in which government cards were created in which areas were drawn in which blacks lived. They were considered risky investments.

“For far too long, these communities were treated as sacrificial zones on the periphery of greedy, insensitive industries. The most dirty communities should now primarily be used for investments in clean energy and the elimination and renovation of the dirty infrastructure for fossil fuels,” said Saha.

Another area that the researchers warn is the influence of the fossil fuels on the environment and that: Up to a third of the flora and fauna, the fossil fuels could not be controlled in the next 50 years, according to the summary. In addition, the industry for fossil fuels would heat up the production of, which leads to an ubiquitous pollution of air, water, soil, food, wild animals and people.

According to the authors and authors One would have tried to disguise the dangers of the products and to block measures to exit fossil fuels.

“The industry for fossil fuels has deceived us for decades about the damage from its products and worked on preventing meaningful climate protection measures,” said Naomi Oreskes, professor of science history at Harvard University. “Perverse, our governments continue to issue hundreds of billions of dollars of subsidies for this harmful industry. It is high time that this stops.”