Binational treatment plant: model or muddle?

U.S.-Mexico

Cross-border cooperation is proving easier said than done when it comes to treating sewage in the fast-growing San Diego-Tijuana region. A dispute between the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and two San Diego-area Congressmen has delayed improvements at the South Bay International Wastewater Treatment Plant on the U.S.-Mexico border for more than a year. As a result, wastewater from Tijuana is receiving insufficient treatment and being piped into the Pacific Ocean with unhealthy levels of dioxins and other contaminants. Such is the pollution, in fact, that the California Attorney General’s Office is now preparing to sue the federal government and fine it $1,000 a day. And the Surfrider Foundation, a nonprofit environmental watchdog founded by surfers, this month filed its own... [Log in to read more]

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