New analysis backs up the issues of people that stay close to the Tijuana River and have lengthy complained that foul air wafting from the polluted waterway is making them sick — irritating their eyes and noses, making respiration tough and inflicting complications. The examine signifies they’re being uncovered to excessive ranges of the poisonous gasoline hydrogen sulfide.
Because the river flows via Baja California, it takes in untreated sewage and industrial waste from Tijuana, then crosses the U.S.-Mexico border into San Diego County, the place seashores are commonly closed as a result of the surf is crammed with micro organism from the river. Researchers have now gained new insights into how that water air pollution is creating air air pollution that besets close by communities.
Utilizing an air-quality monitor practically half a mile from the river in the neighborhood of Nestor, scientists discovered extraordinarily excessive ranges of hydrogen sulfide, a gasoline linked to sewage that smells like rotten eggs.
“It validates what the community has been saying for so long,” stated Benjamin Rico, a doctoral researcher at UC San Diego and co-author of the examine.
The findings present “their complaints are real and valid, and need to be listened to,” he stated.
The examine, printed Thursday within the journal Science, tracked air air pollution emanating from a foamy, churning part of the river the place water falls from culverts. Rico stated it’s a sizzling spot the place the falling water kinds bubbles that burst and ship high quality particles of pollution into the air.
Recording measurements in September 2024, the researchers discovered residents in Nestor had been uncovered to ranges exceeding the California normal for 5 to 14 hours every day. At night time, the hourly common reached 70 instances the usual, or 2,100 elements per billion, with shorter peaks of not less than a minute reaching 4,500 elements per billion.
California’s ambient air-quality normal for hydrogen sulfide is 30 elements per billion averaged over one hour.
“The levels are definitely concerning,” stated examine co-author Kimberly Prather, a UC San Diego professor of atmospheric chemistry and founding co-director of the Airborne Institute. “Nobody should be breathing that gas day after day — or in this case, night after night.”
Public well being officers have described hydrogen sulfide as a nuisance within the space, saying it doesn’t pose quick dangers for residents.
Nevertheless, research have discovered that respiration hydrogen sulfide at sure ranges could cause dizziness, complications, vomiting, cough, chest tightness and melancholy. Being uncovered to excessive ranges within the office is a recognized well being hazard, together with amongst employees at wastewater remedy vegetation. However much less is thought in regards to the well being results of power publicity.
Along with hydrogen sulfide, the researchers detected a whole lot of different gases spreading via communities.
Different analysis has proven that airborne spray from the Tijuana River comprises chemical substances together with drug byproducts, compounds from tires and private care merchandise. Residents say they’re additionally involved about pollution discharged from factories in Mexico.
“Nobody knows what the health effects are of breathing that level of hydrogen sulfide gas, plus the viruses, plus the bacteria, plus all the other chemicals that we’ve detected,” Prather stated. “It’s just a cocktail of many, many, many chemicals.”
The researchers discovered excessive ranges of hydrogen sulfide on the identical instances that residents submitted extra complaints to native air high quality authorities. They collected knowledge over three weeks through the dry season, when usually the one water flowing within the river channel is wastewater.
Rico stated that whereas spending nights close by in Imperial Seaside, he was woke up by a stench that he described as piercing, one thing he additionally heard from residents.
“I couldn’t sleep. It was stressful to be in that environment,” he stated.
The researchers wore respirators whereas working close to the river. But Rico stated even when ranges had been excessive, he noticed youngsters taking part in soccer at a faculty playground near the monitoring website. It’s considered one of 11 colleges within the space.
He hopes the findings will immediate measures to guard the group, particularly youngsters who’re uncovered each day.
“This is an urgent and ongoing air quality crisis that needs to be addressed,” he stated.
One precedence ought to be upgrading the Saturn Boulevard river crossing, he stated, the place the culverts create a small waterfall, to get rid of the churning water that spews air pollution.
The San Diego County Air Air pollution Management District has been offering dwelling air purifiers to residents, and Rico stated these efforts ought to be stepped up to make sure everybody within the space has gas-scrubbing air filters.
In July, the U.S. and Mexican governments signed an settlement pledging to wash up the river.
This week, the U.S. Environmental Safety Company introduced that employees have completed an growth of the South Bay Worldwide Wastewater Remedy Plant north of the border, which handles sewage from Tijuana. The EPA stated the improve ought to assist deal with the sewage drawback and the foul odors.
Prather stated the analysis underlines the necessity for additional efforts to guard residents. pressing motion.
“It’s just not right,” she stated. “These people need, and deserve, to not be breathing this air.”
The analysis staff included scientists at UC San Diego’s Scripps Establishment of Oceanography, UC Riverside, San Diego State College and the Nationwide Heart for Atmospheric Analysis.
The authors stated their findings on the Tijuana River level to a necessity for extra analysis into air air pollution coming from different polluted rivers and lakes world wide.
“This is the first study that has shown this many gases coming out of a river, and these types of gases at these levels,” Prather stated. “I hope it opens up research around the world to protect people from breathing other things that are coming out of polluted water bodies.”
