New River (Salton Sea)
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New River Río Nuevo |
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 The New River on the border between Mexico and the United States in 2005 |
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| Data | ||
| Water code | US : 246494 | |
| location | Baja California (Mexico) and California (USA) | |
| River system | New River | |
| source | in the municipality of Mexicali 32 ° 31 ′ 26 ″ N , 115 ° 26 ′ 13 ″ W |
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| muzzle | in Imperial County in the Salton Sea Coordinates: 33 ° 8 ′ 18 ″ N , 115 ° 41 ′ 41 ″ W 33 ° 8 ′ 18 ″ N , 115 ° 41 ′ 41 ″ W
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| length | 125 km | |
| Drain |
MNQ |
18 m³ / s |
| Big cities | Mexicali | |
| Medium-sized cities | Calexico | |
The New River ( Spanish: Río Nuevo ) is a 125-kilometer tributary of the Salton Sea in the Mexican state of Baja California and in the US state of California . The river has its source in Mexico and crosses the border to the USA at Mexicali / Calexico . The average flow rate at its confluence with the Salton Sea is 18 cubic meters per second.
The river was created in 1907 when the dam of the Colorado River broke , which caused massive amounts of water to flow into the depression of the later Salton Sea for several years. One of the drainage routes ran through Mexican territory and on what was then the edge of Mexicali. Mexican farmers and increasingly industrial companies and the municipal administrations of the neighboring cities, which have grown tremendously over the decades, used the resulting bed for drainage. This is where the name New River comes from .
The New River has long been the most polluted river in the United States. The pollution resulted mainly from the discharge of waste from agriculture, chemistry and industry (share from the USA: 18.4%, share from Mexico: 51.2%), the completely untreated wastewater from Mexicali (29%) and other industrial and Manufacturing facilities in Mexico (1%). The pollution represented a large part of the burden on the ecological balance of the Salton Sea.
Beginning in the 1990s, cross-border efforts were made to rehabilitate the river. In 2007, Mexicali's new wastewater treatment plant went into operation, 55% funded by California and 45% by Mexico. From one day to the next, around 75 million liters of highly polluted water in the river were replaced by the same amount of treated water.
Since 2001, new wetlands have been created on the banks of the US side, in which dams were relocated and plants typical of the area were settled. These wetlands now act as additional biological sewage treatment plants and reduce the bacterial load and suspended matter in the river by 95–99% (as of 2014). Even after the rehabilitation efforts to date, the New River is considered to be polluted, but the results are described as a great success.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ The San Diego Union-Tribune: The New River: An environmental success story , April 23, 2014