EPA Steps In To Protect San Diego From Tijuana's Untreated Wastewater
A longstanding wastewater issue between the U.S. and Mexico has now spurred action from the U.S. EPA.
Hundreds of millions of gallons of untreated wastewater flowed from Tijuana to the beaches of San Diego this month, causing a noticeable smell and widespread beach closures. Though recent storms exacerbated the problem, the underlying causes aren’t novel.
“For decades, Tijuana’s wastewater system has been overwhelmed by the city’s fast-expanding population,” The San Diego Union-Tribune explained. “Thousands of homes, including makeshift villages along the border, have no plumbing and discharge feces, urine and trash directly into creeks and canyons that flow toward the border whenever it rains.”
Wastewater professionals on both sides of the border have been exploring infrastructure fixes since last year. And a recent cross-border trade negotiation has apparently netted funding that the top environmental regulator in the U.S. will funnel toward fixes as well.
“The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has secured roughly $300 million under a 2019 trade agreement with Mexico and Canada,” the Union-Tribune reported. “Much of the money appears to be slated for water-quality projects along the border in San Diego.”
EPA officials did not share a timeline for the construction of new projects with reporters, but there has been some specific indication of how it will be deployed, at least initially.
“In coming months, the agency plans to start an environmental review of a suite of projects, most notably building a second diversion pump in the channel, which would be located just north of the border,” according to the Los Angeles Times. “Officials in San Diego have backed building the new pumping system in the U.S. since … 2019.”
Meanwhile, officials in Mexico are working to address the issue as well. They are working to establish a water recycling plant in Baja California and have reportedly upgraded the sewer pipeline and a pump serving the Tijuana River.
“Baja officials also said that ground was broken this past week on a project to replace a notorious, crumbling wastewater treatment plant called San Antonio de los Buenos,” per the Times. “The more than 30-year-old facility, located about six miles south of the border along the coast of Punta Bandera, is in such disrepair it regularly discharges untreated sewage directly into the ocean.”
As these sides work on desperately needed infrastructure fixes for this cross-border waterbody, residents of both countries remain hopeful that their shared waters will soon be clean.
To read more about how outdated wastewater infrastructure can lead to pollution, visit Water Online’s Source Water Contamination Solutions Center.