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Here, the Pacific is a wild body of water that stretches and undulates for hundreds of square kilometers, following the movement of currents, tides and the summer breeze. Where the waves break – and the liquid mixes with the white foam – the green is lighter and darkens as it nears the horizon until it turns blue. The occasional cowboy will ride a horse along the shore, dodging the remains of giant seaweed, clues to the vast prairie that must lie below. And with a little patience you can see dolphins swimming and jumping.
For years this has been the most recommended thing in some parts of this ocean: think about it because if you dive into its waters, worse if you accidentally swallow it, you can contaminate yourself with faeces, enterococci that sometimes occur worryingly Amounts that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says can cause skin, eye, ear, and respiratory disorders in bathers. These pathogens also destroy the marine and terrestrial flora and fauna, the main inhabitants of this place, before humans.
Even breathing close to shore can be harmful. Here’s what researchers at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego found: “Coastal waters polluted by sewage are carried into the atmosphere in marine aerosols created by crashing waves and bursting bubbles.” This study was published in 2022 at Imperial Beach in the United States, just across the border from Tijuana. They did so during the winter when nearly “50 million gallons of contaminated sewage entered the sea via the Tijuana River,” according to the investigation.
So it’s a bi-national problem, affecting the coast, from Rosarito south of Tijuana to sometimes Coronado in San Diego, California. Currents and nature know no borders. However, the economic ability of these two countries to face this situation is very different. According to the latest data from the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI) of Mexico, the GDP per capita of Baja California, the state where Tijuana is located, was more than 152,000 pesos (about $9,000) in 2020. California in the United States had a GDP per capita of about $73,000.
Joana Gonzalez takes water samples in Playa Blanca. AIMEE MELO
two reasons
On a muggy July afternoon, a meeting of the International Boundary and Water Commission (CILA) between Mexico and the United States was held in Tijuana in a large, air-conditioned building. There they discussed the main reasons why the border town’s sewage ends up in the sea. To simplify and shorten the technical implications, there are two causes: the malfunctioning of the San Antonio de los Buenos Aires wastewater treatment plant, also known as Punta Bandera, and the sewage and sewage problems that result in the waste eventually entering the Tijuana river, which it empties into the sea, on the US side.
like dr Víctor Daniel Amador, director of the Tijuana State Public Services Commission (CESPT) in charge of managing the Punta Bandera power plant, explained at the meeting that the operation of this infrastructure has been suspended since around 2015. “We have a very primary procedure. This will pollute the beaches,” he said. He also spoke of the fines already being paid to the National Water Commission (Conagua) for the poor treatment of this facility, which spews waste into the sea at a rate of 1,100 liters per second.
Referring to the inefficiencies in the city’s drainage and sanitation, Amador admitted, “We dump treated water into the Tijuana River, and then that water is mixed with river water that comes from some drains or drains, and it’s treated again.” Effort is wasted because it is treated and contaminated.”
Adding to these inefficiencies are structural problems due to this border town’s rapid growth: “All sorts of corruption that have allowed the construction of draining settlements.” [deshechos] for the poorest neighborhoods,” says Fay Crevoshay, director of communications and public policy at the environmental organization Costasalvaje.
One of the Tijuana River’s tributaries flows through Los Laureles Canyon, “and you have to see it to believe the tsunami of trash.” We collected 200,000 pounds of tires and plastic. Sewage flows through this river all year round,” says Crevoshay. That’s not far from where the Tijuana River meets the Pacific Ocean.
One of the most polluted beaches in the country
Around eight in the morning, Joana González puts on high waterproof boots and goes to the beach to fill a small clear bottle with water. As a member of the Proyecto Fronterizo de Educación Ambiental (PFEA) organization, she is responsible for monitoring the water quality on this coast every Thursday. This civil organization is also part of Waterkeeper, an international alliance fighting for the right to clean and healthy water.
Joana Beach, Playa Blanca, south of Tijuana, has been one of the most polluted in all of Mexico for years. In the last sample published by the PFEA in early August, this beach was the only one found not to be suitable for recreational use. His enterococci count reached nearly 5,000 and the limit set by Mexican authorities is 200 per 100 milliliters of water. Multiply it by twenty-five.
In June, the beach was also found to have very high levels by surveillance by the government agency responsible for the area, the Baja California State Commission on Health Hazards Protection (Coepris). That’s why there’s a sign nailed in the sand that says “Precautionary closure due to health hazards”. But nothing prevents access and you can see people walking and playing sports at the beginning of the day.
According to Erwin Areizaga Uribe, director of Coepris, in addition to this location, there is currently “a lock in the Punta Bandera area” and also in Rosarito, near Quintas del Mar.
Looking at the historical data of the Coepris sampling, these closures appear to be unprecedented as from 2014 to 2022 all beaches analyzed in Tijuana were eligible for this commission. Something completely different than what they have been documenting from the PFEA for years. The main reasons are two. On the one hand, Coepris publishes results only twice a year, PFEA does it every week on their social networks because they consider it part of citizens’ right to information so they can avoid risks when going to the beach. On the other hand, from 2017 to this year, Coepris stopped analyzing the water quality in Playa Blanca, although several environmental groups have been denouncing the pollution for some time.
Margarita Díaz, director of the PFEA, recalls that the anomalies only started in late 2017: “South of the treatment plant [de Punta Bandera]we were like hundreds and the numbers are skyrocketing [de enterococos] Thousands and it wasn’t going down, it was going up steadily.” They spoke to authorities to ask if there was anything wrong with the plant, “and they told us no and no,” Díaz says.
Since 2023 C, it has increased the number of supervised beaches and, in the period leading up to the holidays, has alerted the competent authorities, in this case those of the Municipality, to the need to close some stretches of coast.
A question of environmental justice
At the IBWC meeting on a muggy July afternoon, several speakers presented possible solutions to the pollution problem. Almost 9,500 million pesos (half a million euros) worth of projects for new sewage treatment plants and sanitation infrastructure, funded by the Mexican authorities and also by the US agency EPA. However, they are still in the tendering phase and are not expected to be fully operational until 2028 if approved.
Tourists and locals visit the beach in Playas de Tijuana.AIMEE MELO
Some environmental organizations say the solution is to develop a water reuse method, as this part of Mexico is increasingly suffering from scarcity problems, and this would be a way to create a closed loop without contamination: the water would leave homes as waste. and would return to homes potable. However, at the same meeting, Dr. Amador, director of the Tijuana State Public Services Commission (CESPT), during a question and answer session, said the rejection was not easy because it would mean large investments in new infrastructure.
The situation appears to have been stuck for a long time, and this not only poses a risk to public health, but also compromises environmental justice. Díaz, the director of the PFEA, warns that the beach is one of the few free recreational spaces for citizens. He explains that his organization conducted a survey a few years ago and “the population that lives east of the city is the one that gets to the beach.” The population that gets into the water is the one with the fewest resources. [Las personas] They are exposed, they are ignored because they are not interested. It’s not the five star hotel, it’s not the businessman.”
This claim is linked to something fundamental in the design of this city. It was defined by artist Raúl Cárdenas, founder of Torolab, a collective looking for ways to improve the urban environment of some areas of this metropolis. “Tijuana turns its back on the sea”. It’s a place that has exclusive apartment skyscrapers that claim, “You have a view of San Diego or the border.” What interests us is that line. An aggressive, hard, one-sided border,” says Cardenas.