soil

Soil is selected as a keyword because it operates simultaneously as a material fragment and an active actor within Bogotá’s waste infrastructures. As a stratified archive, soil accumulates leachate residues, heavy metals, ammoniacal compounds, and sediment displacement, recording infrastructural failures over time in ways that air or surface water cannot. Contamination becomes invisible yet durable, embedding environmental harm directly into the ground. Soil also makes visible the long temporalities of colonial urbanism, where extractive logics and unequal land distribution determine which districts receive environmental protection and which are systematically exposed to toxicity.

In Bogotá, soil becomes a fragment through which the political history of waste is materially legible. Technical studies of the Doña Juana Landfill document high concentrations of lead, cadmium, chromium, and ammonium compounds in surrounding soils, introduced through recurrent leachate infiltration (Ebiotrade 2025). Geotechnical research identifies areas of reduced shear strength, ground saturation, and slope instability, conditions that contributed to past landslide events and continue to shape the landfill’s operational risks (Springer 2023).

These accumulations form a set of fragments: chemically altered soils, unstable clay layers, contaminated sediments, and shifting ground. Each fragment stores evidence of infrastructural stress and uneven environmental exposure.

Bogotá’s southern topography further amplifies these conditions. Sediments travel downslope toward Ciudad Bolívar, where informal settlements expand on unconsolidated soils. Many households lack drainage systems or sealed floors, exposing residents to direct contact with contaminated ground. Soil contamination is therefore spatially unequal, disproportionately burdening southern districts and embedding socio-environmental inequality into the terrain itself.

Actor–Network Theory highlights how soil actively participates in socio-political and ecological networks. Contaminated soil has repeatedly activated collective mobilisation, most notably the 2025 community blockades that temporarily halted access to Doña Juana and disrupted municipal waste flows (Infobae 2025). Soil instability has also forced operational adjustments at the landfill due to odour events, slope failures, and emergency drainage interventions.

As contaminants migrate through hydrological systems—moving from soil into groundwater, quebradas, and eventually the Tunjuelo River—they activate new actors: recycladores, engineers monitoring slope failure, children exposed to polluted play areas, and residents organising around environmental harm. Soil is therefore not inert; its shifting chemical and physical conditions reshape behaviours, policies, and infrastructural responses. It acts alongside other materials such as clouds, water bodies, and debris fragments to co-produce Bogotá’s waste ecologies.

Current evidence indicates that leachate infiltration from Doña Juana continues to introduce persistent heavy metals and ammoniacal pollutants into surrounding soils (Ebiotrade 2025). These contaminants threaten vegetation, human health, and local hydrological systems, particularly in the Tunjuelo watershed, where groundwater and quebrada networks transport pollutants downslope.

The impacts are unevenly distributed. Informal settlements in Ciudad Bolívar—especially those without sealed floors or drainage infrastructure—face heightened exposure. Recycladores working near waste flows, children living close to unstable slopes, and households reliant on contaminated earth for daily activities experience amplified risk. Soil thus becomes a medium through which structural inequalities are reproduced.

Bogotá’s polluted soils are not isolated events but expressions of a longer history of extractivism, dispossession, and uneven urbanisation. The siting of hazardous waste infrastructure in the urban south—home to low-income, displaced, and racialised populations—continues patterns rooted in colonial land distribution. The persistence of contamination, from the 1997 and 2015 landslide events to ongoing leachate leaks, shows how modern waste systems reproduce these historical hierarchies.

Yet soil also shapes future possibilities. Contaminated ground becomes a site for technical remediation, environmental justice claims, and community-led monitoring. Rather than treating soil solely as damaged terrain requiring sanitation, recognising it as a recording surface and an active actor opens space for alternative environmental futures—where repair, accountability, and local governance are materially grounded.

Reference List: Vargas, J., Ramírez, L. and Castillo, P. (2024) ‘Factors influencing environmental awareness and solid waste management practices in low-income communities in Bogotá, Colombia’, Air, Soil and Water Research, 17(1). Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/11786221241261188 (Accessed: 2 December 2025). Greenpeace Colombia (2024) Relleno sanitario Doña Juana: Una bomba de tiempo para las comunidades y el ambiente. Available at: https://www.greenpeace.org/colombia/noticia/campanas/contaminacion/relleno-sanitario-dona-juana-una-bomba-de-tiempo/ (Accessed: 2 December 2025). Molina, D. (2023) ‘Environmental risk and geotechnical instability around Bogotá’s Doña Juana Landfill’, in Urban Environmental Challenges in Latin America. Cham: Springer. Available at: https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-55120-8_5 (Accessed: 2 December 2025). Rodríguez, A. and Rincón, J. (2023) ‘Gestión del riesgo ambiental y sistemas de residuos sólidos en el sur de Bogotá’, Revista de Investigaciones Universidad del Rosario, 20(3). Available at: https://www.redalyc.org/journal/811/81162395006/ (Accessed: 2 December 2025). Infobae (2025) ‘Crisis en Bogotá por bloqueo en relleno sanitario Doña Juana’, Infobae, 21 May. Available at: https://www.infobae.com/colombia/2025/05/21/crisis-en-bogota-por-bloqueo-en-relleno-sanitario-dona-juana/ (Accessed: 2 December 2025). Environmental Health Perspectives (2016) ‘Health risks associated with landfill emissions in Latin American urban environments’, Environmental Health Perspectives. Available at: https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/abs/10.1289/isee.2016.4001 (Accessed: 2 December 2025).