The Murcia regional government has paid a total of 559,302 euros for land contaminated with heavy metals and toxic waste used to block the El Lirio deposit in Cartagena. This figure is more than double the original budget of 252,000 euros and should be a clean sum according to the technical specifications. This is stated in a document provided by the Ministry of the Environment to the First Investigative Court of the port city following a magistrate’s order regarding the closure of mining facilities carried out by the Regional Administration and the public company Tragusa in 2024.
The Murcia government justified the 122% higher cost of topsoil than originally planned on the basis that the amount ultimately purchased increased to 55,000 tonnes instead of 35,000 tonnes.
These significant changes in the price and volume of land were approved by the Provincial Government Council of Murcia after the supply. Legal sources consulted by this paper say the measure is unusual because major changes in the costs of public contracts are subject to administrative control before they can be implemented. Similarly, public sector procurement laws do not allow contracts to be modified by more than 50% of the original amount without a second bid, they added.
Due to the toxic substances, 9% of the total cost of El Lirio’s environmental remediation work was disbursed from the national treasury without re-tendering, amounting to 6.2 million euros, with subsidies of 4 million euros from the Ministry of Environment, Migration and Population Affairs (MITECO) and 843,000 euros from the European Union.
Topsoil 2 batches
In 2021, Tragusa awarded 35,000 tonnes of “top soil of the highest quality” to the construction company González Soto SA, which recently became the official contractor of the public company, for 209,300 euros. Land was supplied between February and July 2024, but quantities varied widely. According to the certificate signed by Environment and Tragsa, the first lot was 33,000 tonnes and paid €338,158, while another lot was 22,000 tonnes and paid €221,144.
A person close to the El Lirio cleanup and helping carry it out explained that “in large-scale operations of this type,” it is common for “the amount and price of materials to increase,” but that “there is always a good reason in advance and the fluctuations are small.” “I have never seen the price jump more than double the original price,” he added.
According to the technical specifications, the overburden needed to be clean and healthy to complete the environmental remediation of the deposit, which was the only mass of work that increased at such a high rate. It had virtually no commercial value, given the contamination conditions that existed then and now, including levels of heavy metals such as lead, arsenic and manganese that well exceeded the safety standards established in the Murcia region, and hundreds of slags from lead smelting that released toxins over time.
The local government has not responded to questions posed by this newspaper to obtain the paper’s version.
Projects that have since been modified
The changes to the project, which required an increase in the amount and volume of topsoil to be certified, were made in September 2024, several months after purchasing the project, by which time construction was already substantially complete. The new project was approved by the Regional Government Council on October 31st. Among other things, it was alleged that the area of land targeted for decontamination was larger than expected. The land had already been distributed between February and July.
Once supplies began, formal changes were made to the contract submitted to González Soto in March 2024. The price of the land rose to 313,950 euros, which was still far from the final price of 559,302 euros. Tragusa sources elaborated that “the thickness of the overburden profile had to be changed during the execution of the work.” An expert report submitted by the state-owned company in court cited more than 100 analyzes revealing the contamination, but made no mention of increased prices for the materials.
Contamination known to responsible parties
The local government and Tragusa also knew before increasing spending that the topsoil contained very high levels of heavy metals. Tests at the source commissioned by the company itself in February 2024 showed up to 767 milligrams per kilogram (mg/kg) of lead and 36.1 mg/kg of arsenic, both at 20% This significantly exceeds Murcia’s draft law for General Reference Levels (NGR) for the declaration of contaminated soils in 2025, which sets the maximum permissible lead level at 115 mg/kg and the safe limit at 115 mg/kg. This last metalloid was above the industrial threshold. Similarly, 94% of samples taken by Tragusa after construction was completed had lead levels above legal levels.
In a statement to this newspaper, soil science and contaminated soil experts from the Universities of Granada and Barcelona concluded that the land “cannot under any circumstances be used for environmental remediation works”, declared it “potentially contaminated” and should be removed from the El Lirio blockade as soon as possible. The materials received by engineers and project managers include slag from lead smelting, as well as asphalt, bricks, slabs, metal chips and plastic debris.
This reality contrasts with the version provided by sources linked to works referenced by this newspaper. “From the first day before supply, Tragusa was very careful with the materials. We took samples to the laboratory, went to the sources to check the quality, inspected every detail no matter how small. We checked the trucks during transport, we weighed them. Everything was under control. It is impossible to overlook a toxic substance with such values and visible physical residues in the ground,” he says.
The technical specifications state that the topsoil must be of “the highest quality”, and the state-owned company promises to “control the proper preparation of the material as often as necessary”, reserving the right to refuse it “if local experience so advises and if visual inspection does not comply with the description”.
million euro business
Despite the judicial guidance from El Lirio, González Soto SA continues to be a contractor to Tragusa, which provides aggregates for the cleanup of other mine dumps currently being carried out in the Cartagena and La Union regions, as company officials confirmed to this newspaper. In August 2025, the construction company won a tender for the supply of aggregates from the El Cargador deposit for 3.2 million euros, and together with several other companies participated in a separate contract for 7 million euros, which was officially concluded in February 2025, for the collection of materials, including overburden, at mining facilities in the Llano del Vir area.
Currently, as the editorial team has been able to confirm, González Soto’s trucks are frequenting the El Diseño factory, laden with materials. The technical specifications for said environmental remediation, also prepared by Tragusa, have maximum values for heavy metals that the aggregate must comply with, and the quality of the topsoil is limited by the National Decree 867/2010 of 2 July 2010 on cultivation substrates, with a lead limit of 45 mg/kg that is permissible in the field. This type of information is not found in El Lirio documents.
environmental risk
The additional economic cost of the toxic land in El Lirio was 327,302 euros compared to the forecast. Environmental costs may be higher in environments protected by the Natura 2000 network and regulated by the Murcia Regional Natural Resources Management Plan (PORN) within Community Important Areas (SCI) and as part of the Regional Parks of Calblanc, Monte de las Cenisas and Peña del Águila.
In documents submitted to the court, the Murcia administration defends the quality of the work on the basis that the El Lirio land is an old mining facility and therefore subject to industrial use. It turns out that industrial NGR is more lenient, so heavy metals from the topsoil are below it. This premise is in direct conflict with the 4 million euro subsidy agreement signed between the Autonomous Community itself and MITECO, which was published in the Official Gazette and explicitly prohibits land use of mineral deposits other than forests for a period of 75 years. This condition was essential to raising funds and making construction possible.
The initiative, described by the regional government as “Spain’s largest mining environmental remediation”, follows a complaint by Ecologitas en Acción for crimes against natural resources and the environment and alleged misappropriation of public funds, leading to a public judicial proceeding examining incriminating evidence against the regional administration and Tragusa.
About The Author
