Playa Escondida cleanup sets July record as runoff season peaks

Volunteer crews working the intertidal zone at Playa Escondida removed 14.3 tonnes of plastic and organic debris over the weekend of 25–26 July, the highest single-month total recorded at that beach since the Clean Coast Cooperative began keeping separate beach-by-beach tallies in 2019.

The figure brings the northern beach's July running total to 41.7 tonnes, surpassing the previous July record of 38.2 tonnes set in 2022. The surge coincides with the peak of the rainy season, when swollen rivers carry agricultural runoff and discarded plastics from inland settlements to the coast.

María Santos, the cooperative's tally coordinator, said the weekend haul included an unusually high proportion of single-use food containers and sachet wrappers — items that suggest the upstream source is shifting from household waste to roadside food-vendor litter.

The cooperative's data, submitted weekly to the Marine Ministry in Puerto Azul, is one of the primary sources for the federal government's annual coastal pollution assessment. The July spike is expected to feature in the ministry's August briefing to the Federal Assembly's environment committee.