(DailyDig.com) – Over the past five years, a crisis at the border of the US and Mexico regarding a public health risk has been building. According to the US Clean Water Act, the Tijuana River has been delivering contaminated water into San Diego, California, from Mexico.
A recently released report states that the river traverses down a canyon to flow into the Pacific Ocean. Just south of Mexico’s border with the US, the ocean swells coming from south of the river, pushing the contaminated water north toward San Diego.
Paloma Aguirre, Mayor of Imperial Beach in San Diego County, said that the odor of the toxic bacteria that comes from fecal matter fouls the air of their quaint town. This is especially true when ocean currents and wind combine to create an environmental disaster that affects citizens’ health.
According to Aguirre, as of February, the sewage risk had closed the beach for 805 days. The International Boundary and Water Commission (IBWC) reports that untreated sewage, urban runoff, and industrial waste entered the Tijuana River in Mexico for 120 miles before reaching the ocean.
To treat this sewage before it reaches the ocean, the US side of the border built the International Wastewater Treatment Plant. A treaty between the US and Mexico allocated the management of the plant to the IBWC, with the aim of treating 25 million gallons of untreated sewage water daily. Infrastructure breakdowns on the Tijuana side and the 2023 Tropical Storm Hilary have reduced the plant’s daily treatment capacity to only 22.7 million gallons.
Morgan Rogers, the IBWC’s operations manager in San Diego, said that each gallon that is treated is less waste that is released into the ocean. He discussed the ongoing upgrades they are implementing and the upcoming 400 million dollar US-funded expansion that should double their capacity. He stated that they would need 200 million dollars to complete their expansion.
The former mayor of Tijuana, Kurt Honold, apologized and stated that they would be fixing the problem. They are currently constructing a new water treatment plant to open this September.
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