Nightmare in paradise: Canary Islands face wastewater crisis • FRANCE 24 English

40 Olympic-sized swimming pools. That’s the amount of wastewater that is being discharged every day into the sea around the Canary Islands. There are 400 waste discharge points on the islands and only a quarter of them are legal. There has been no proper planning for wastewater treatment despite the tourist boom and an increased population on the islands over the last few decades. Most of the islands’ wastewater is untreated or barely treated before being ejected into the sea through sometimes illegal channels. The authorities are trying to accelerate the rollout of state-of-the-art purification plants, but the situation remains very worrying. Our team went to the popular tourist island of Tenerife to find out more. Report by Armelle Exposito, Victoria David and Sarah Morris 

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12 comments
  1. Disgraceful. Over tourism is destroying the ecosystem. Well done those speaking out boldly and also those working hard on technological band aids. But surely NO MORE HOTELS!

  2. Paying attention to your city is the right thing to do hotels should be responsible for the discharge process if not they should be denied licenses to operate…

  3. I will help locals by not coming this year, i was there every years for 10 years. Mass tourism is just crazy. 8 MIO fine is a joke, it should be 800 MIO and things would be solved fast.

  4. It's not just waste water, everywhere you go in Tenerife there is rubbish and waste. When it rains everything washes into the sea. 8 million€ in fines is actually laughable.

  5. The canary Islands has the SAME problem as the rest of the world: 14,007 residents in 2000 and 49,270 in 2022. 
    There are currently 8 BILLION people on the planet and that number GROWS by 70 MILLION EVERY YEAR= SEE THE PROBLEM?

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