Contamination Threatens 80% of Quintana Roo’s Urban Cenotes

Quintana Roo, Mexico — Between 70 and 80 percent of the approximately 150 cenotes located in urban and peripheral areas of municipalities in northern Quintana Roo show some degree of contamination, a situation that directly threatens the underground aquifer, which supplies 100% of the region’s water, stated Epigmenio Cortés of the Benito Juárez College of Biologists.

With the goal of understanding the real state of these water bodies, the citizen science collective Cenotes Urbanos is developing a long-term monitoring project to analyze water quality and track the impacts of population growth, intensive extraction, and increasing pollution sources such as wastewater discharges, septic tanks, and urban runoff.

According to official data, in 2022, 49.8% of the water from monitored wells in the state showed contamination by organic matter, a figure that experts believe has not decreased. “We believe the pollution of these bodies has increased,” warned Cortés.

In the northern zone of the state, there is a high density of cenotes: in Benito Juárez there are more than 60 identified, in Playa del Carmen around 40, in Puerto Morelos at least 20, and in Tulum more than 70, several of them in areas of real estate and tourist expansion. The total number in Quintana Roo exceeds a thousand underground water bodies, although not all are mapped or protected, and in many cases they are exploited as tourist attractions.

The organization highlighted that the importance of cenotes goes beyond their tourist value, as they are direct windows to the aquifer, function as natural filters, habitats for endemic species and underground biological corridors, in addition to being key points for freshwater recharge. “Their contamination implies an immediate risk to the quality of water that reaches all households,” warned Cortés.