<p>Despite the expanding petroleum refinery sector in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, a multi-pathway human health risk assessment (HRA) linking spatial soil contamination to child and adult receptor risks has not been reported for the Erbil Oil Refinery, the region’s largest crude-processing facility. This study presents the first three-pathway (ingestion, dermal, inhalation) HRA of 17 potentially toxic metals and total petroleum hydrocarbons (TPH) in surface soils from 22 sites across the ~ 350 km² refinery impact zone, following USEPA RAGS methodology with inverse distance weighting (IDW) spatial mapping. Geo-accumulation indices revealed severe beryllium enrichment (Class 5) together with moderate-to-heavy cadmium and lead contamination, concentrated in an industrial cluster proximal to the refinery; principal component analysis identified refinery–vehicular emissions as the dominant contamination source. Non-carcinogenic risk was acceptable for adult receptors but unacceptable for children at all 22 sampling sites, with ingestion as the dominant exposure pathway and beryllium the primary hazard driver. Carcinogenic risk remained within the tolerable range for both receptors, with arsenic as the principal carcinogenic contributor. By providing a spatially explicit, evidence-based risk baseline, these findings underline the urgent need for child-targeted soil remediation and risk management near petroleum refinery facilities in semi-arid environments.</p> Graphical Abstract <p></p>