Fight to Save Puerto Morelos’ Marine Life

PUERTO MORELOS — Environmentalists from the collective Unidos por la Madre Naturaleza have publicly expressed their rejection of the proposed construction of a deep-water port in the Punta Brava zone, located 10 kilometers south of Puerto Morelos. They argue the project threatens reefs, mangroves, seagrass beds, and sea turtle nesting areas, ecosystems of high ecological value.

Organizers of the opposition campaign stated, "In Puerto Morelos, they want to repeat what they already destroyed in Cozumel and Majahual. An industrial pier in Punta Brava puts marine and coastal life at risk. The community is already organizing and we say: no more ports!" The campaign has launched a digital signature drive on the platform docs.google.com, promoted through various Facebook pages, including Manglar Puerto Morelos.

Project Details and Official Stance

The alert was triggered following a public hearing held on July 29, 2025, where the director of the Integral Port Administration of Quintana Roo (Apiqroo), Vagner Elbiorn Vega, informed attendees of the intention to build a 130-hectare cargo port in Punta Brava. The site is recognized for its high abundance of mangroves and sea turtle nests.

Citizen opposition recalled the case of the fourth pier in Cozumel, a project that was canceled after strong social and environmental pressure due to the impacts it would have generated on reefs and areas of high ecological value. They stated that repeating this model in Puerto Morelos would represent a setback in the protection of the coastal ecosystems of the Mexican Caribbean.

As part of the protest, residents and organizations conducted a survey in Punta Brava to highlight the area's natural wealth. They emphasized that the site contains more than 500 sea turtle nests, seagrasses listed in Mexico's NOM-059 environmental protection standard, mangroves of all four species recognized in Mexico, and a shallow coral reef. Furthermore, they underscored that Punta Brava has official protection, being classified as an Environmental Management Unit M-2 under a conservation policy within the Ecological Land Use Planning Program (POET) of the Cancún-Tulum Corridor.

They also noted that in 2024, Mexico established a goal for reducing emissions in ports, which would be jeopardized by projects that prioritize business over life. "We do not need more infrastructure based on fossil fuels; we need living nature, renewable energies, and local economies," they stressed.

Broad Coalition of Opposition

The mobilization against the industrial pier in Punta Brava also includes the collectives and associations Water Soul, Equilibrium Wayak, Puerto Morelos Sustentable, Ocean Solutions, L21, Grupo Gema del Mayab, Red Alto Cultivo, #SOS Cenotes, Conciencia Colectiva, Grupo Tortuguero del Caribe, and Tribu Sustentable, among others.

Apiqroo's Plans and Justification

Vagner Elbiorn Vega, director of Apiqroo, revealed that the agency will initiate procedures to obtain permits to build the deep-water port, which would feature the deepest dredging in the country. The proposed location is 50 kilometers south of Cancún in Punta Brava, where they anticipate depths of 12 to 16 meters. In contrast, the existing cargo port in Puerto Morelos has a navigation channel with a depth of only up to 5.7 meters, which prevents access for large-draft vessels.

"We have always wanted a major deep-water port in Quintana Roo, but there is a limiting factor: in the navigation channel, there is a very large rock, and to remove it would require an implosion that will never happen because it is not permitted; besides, next to it is the reef barrier," he said.

Elbiorn Vega specified that "more than 15 years ago, the then-municipality of Puerto Morelos delivered a large body of water in Punta Brava, which we have in our Master Plan, and that is where a deep-water port could potentially be built at some point." He added, "What we have already done are pre-feasibility studies—environmental, economic, etc.—which gave us very favorable indicators; the most important thing is that if the project is ever carried out in the future, we automatically already have a depth of 12 meters. If we wanted the maximum large draft, we could add between two and four meters more through dredging—we are talking about 14 to 16 meters—and we would have the deepest deep-water port in Mexico. Well, even with 12 meters we could receive cargo," the official stated, noting that this port would be on par with the port of Progreso, Yucatán.

Vagner Elbiorn asserted that this port would allow receiving merchandise from Asia, Europe, North America, and South America. Currently, goods received by the state arrive from Veracruz and Progreso, which is why supplies are so expensive.

Timeline and Contract Award

The document for the promotion and development of the new deep-water port project in the Mexican Caribbean is expected to be ready by March 2026. To that end, Apiqroo has already awarded a contract worth 14 million 848 thousand pesos to the Mexico City-based firm Fingenta Consultores S.C. for the provision of technical accompaniment, financial and legal advisory services for the promotion and development of the new deep-water port project in the Mexican Caribbean, located in Puerto Morelos.