People living in some parts of England are placed at far greater environmental risk than others — from dangerous pollution levels and a lack of access to nature, to flooding and extreme heat.
People of colour and low-income households are over twice as likely to live in neighbourhoods most exposed to environmental harm.
A new tool now makes it possible to see exactly where inequalities are worst, and to identify the communities that need the most urgent support.
Is your neighbourhood at risk?
- Friends of the Earth has teamed up with the Environment Agency, Natural England and leading academics.
- Together, we've developed a new data tool to identify neighbourhoods placed at risk of environmental harms including flood and extreme heat risk, air and noise pollution, and lack of access to green spaces.
- The tool is called the Index of Multiple Environmental Deprivation (IMED).
Who is most likely to live in areas where environmental health risks are highest?
People of colour and low-income households are over twice as likely to live in neighbourhoods most exposed to environmental harm.
Are people on low incomes living in areas at risk of flooding, extreme heat, pollution and lack of access to green spaces?
Environmental deprivation disproportionally impacts on lower income communities. They are around two and a half times more likely to have higher exposure to a combination of pollution, less green space and higher risks of climate impact.
- 49% of the most environmentally deprived neighbourhoods are also the most income deprived neighbourhoods.
- Only 20% of the least environmentally deprived areas are income deprived areas.
Are people of colour living in areas at risk of flooding, extreme heat, pollution and lack of access to green spaces?
People of colour are more than twice as likely to live in the most environmentally deprived third of neighbourhoods than white people.
- Across the 10% most environmentally deprived neighbourhoods, over 60% of the population are people of colour.
- In the 10% of neighbourhoods that are the least environmentally deprived, people of colour comprise just 6% of the population.
This dataset details something that Friends of the Earth has long campaigned to bring to light: that the impacts of the climate crisis are not felt evenly across our society. It’s environmental racism and injustice, plain and simple.
— Asad Rehman, chief executive of Friends of the Earth
More polluted areas with less green space place people at health risk
The third of neighbourhoods with people placed most at risk by environmental challenges have a disproportionate share of poor health outcomes:
- 39% of residents in the most environmentally deprived areas live in the worst‑scoring third of areas for health.
- 26% of people in the least environmentally deprived areas score in that third for health.
Ethnicity, income and environmental disadvantage
It's not surprising that ethnicity, income and environmental disadvantage are linked. Those who do the least to cause environmental harm are hit first and worst by it. Friends of the Earth has been campaigning for a fairer greener world for years.
Environmental disadvantage isn't spread evenly across England — some regions have far more neighbourhoods at risk than others
People on the environmental front line in London
- Half of all neighbourhoods in the capital are in the most environmentally deprived 10% across England.
- 81% of neighbourhoods score in the top third for most environmental deprivation nationally.
- The West Midlands, East of England, East Midlands and South East have between 32% and 27% of neighbourhoods in the top third of environmental deprivation.
- Regions furthest West and North with larger rural populations have the lower levels of environmental deprivation.
A call to action for decision-makers
We encourage all government departments, local authorities, and other decision-makers to embed this official dataset in their resource allocation frameworks, spatial planning decisions, and environmental health strategies. Environmental injustice will not be resolved without deliberate, targeted action — and this tool provides the evidence base to make that action possible.
How can you help?
If you want to help end environmental injustice, sign our petition to make polluters worldwide pay for a greener future.
Interested in the technical details of this work? This page from Natural England's Infrastructure mapping provides more detail. It has an in-depth description of the Index of Multiple Environmental Deprivation (IMED). This covers how data on multiple environmental harms combine into an overall dataset of environmental burden across England. There is source data, mapped attributes, limitations, and key sources of uncertainty.