From www.abc.net.au

On the fringes of Australia's biggest cities, people work, live, and play next to some of the nation's biggest polluters.

Key points:

• National Pollution Inventory data has been mapped according to postcodes

• The Australian Conservation Foundation report reveals the country's most-polluted postcodes

• Botany Bay in Sydney and Altona in Melbourne are the city's most-polluted areas

• For the first time, Australia's pollution has been mapped by postcode in a report titled The Dirty Truth by the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF).

Some of the areas identified as being the most polluted in Australia's capital cities include:

• Botany Bay in Sydney

• Altona in Melbourne

• Port of Brisbane

• Parmelia near Perth

ACF found the lower the postcode's weekly household income, the more likely it was to be home to polluting facilities such as factories and refineries. 

"If you're in that bottom 60 per cent, you're much more likely to live around a polluting facility," ACF economist Matt Rose said.

And if you want to avoid living among pollutants?

"The best way is to have money essentially. And you can buy a house … in suburbs where there aren't any polluting facilities," Mr Rose said.

"They're in the top 20 per cent of income postcodes in Australia."

Read more at ABC News