Mexico Plans Circular Economy Parks to Recycle 76% of Urban Waste in Three States

Mexico City — Mexico’s environment ministry plans to build circular economy parks in three central states that could process and transform 76% of urban solid waste into new products, officials announced Tuesday.

The Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources (Semarnat) said the parks in Puebla, Tlaxcala, and the State of Mexico aim to address the country’s waste crisis, where 140,000 tons of garbage are generated daily.

“This is a new economic sector from which we can obtain enormous profits for Mexico,” said Semarnat head Alicia Bárcena Ibarra during a presentation to the Business Coordinating Council.

Bárcena explained that the transition to a circular economy will be gradual and flexible, following the country’s General Law on the matter. She emphasized that implementation is key to strengthening sustainable development, competitiveness, and environmental protection.

To illustrate the scale of the problem, Bárcena described that Mexico’s daily waste generation equals lining up 100,000 compact cars in a straight line from Mexico City to Guadalajara. The federal strategy seeks to prevent up to 90% of inorganic compounds from ending up in open dumps by reintegrating them into value chains through more efficient production processes.

From Tires to Asphalt and Sargassum to New Materials

Bárcena called on the industrial sector to intervene in the value chain, highlighting critical opportunity areas due to the volume of abandoned materials in the country. She detailed that Mexico has:

• 300 million disused tires that can be processed for asphalt and road surfaces
• 3.7 million tons of textiles in Mexico City alone
• 6.7 million tons of plastic nationwide
• 9.7 million tons of construction debris
• 1.2 million tons of electronic waste
• Large volumes of sargassum in Quintana Roo

In addition to the complexes in central Mexico, the federal government confirmed the creation of a fourth circular economy park in Quintana Roo, specialized in treating and utilizing sargassum, a persistent environmental problem on the Mexican Caribbean coast.

Semarnat committed to facilitating this transition for businesses through simplified procedures, promotion of technology transfer, and opening new financing funds, with the goal of aligning natural resource protection with business profitability.