If nothing is done to immediately conserve water in Utah, scientists in the United States say the Great Salt Lake as we know it will disappear in as little as five years.
, however, suggests the ecosystem is reaching a dangerous tipping point. As millions of liters of water are diverted from the lake annually, salinity levels have begun to increase. Concentrations of salt are now so high, flora and fauna are struggling to survive.
"The lake's North Arm is a warning of what the future could hold unless streamflow is restored. Cut off by a railroad causeway in 1959, the North Arm receives almost no surface runoff," the briefing"The lack of freshwater flow caused salinity to reach saturation, killing the microbialites and algae that form the base of the lake's food web. The disrupted lake circulation temporarily caused the highest methylmercury levels in the country.
Water diverted from the Great Salt Lake and its catchment area – which spans some 23 million acres – is mostly used for industrial agriculture. Three quarters of the consumptive water use from the lake's watershed currently goes into irrigating crops, with mineral extraction sucking up another 9 percent.is the best and possibly only way to save the lake, but that will require systematic political and societal changes to Utah and surrounding states.
"Facing this crisis will require conservation measures unprecedented in living memory," the researchers"Reversing the collapse of the Great Salt Lake system is perhaps the greatest challenge we have faced in the history of our state. However, history shows that our community is capable of just this kind of bold collective action.
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