Life as usual cannot go on in northern Utah if the state wants to replenish the Great Salt Lake to an ideal elevation of water to keep it from the same dry destiny of so many saline lakes in the West and the world.
Researchers broke down the water usage of the Great Salt Lake at between 67% and 73% due to humans, 15% to 23% lost to natural variability, and anywhere from 8% to 11% lost to a warming climate.
Human use includes agriculture, which takes up the bulk of depletions, municipal and industrial consumption, as well as extraction industries that operate adjacent to the Great Salt Lake. The report said mineral extraction industries are impacting levels at the Great Salt Lake in a delicate dance that partners depletion with safeguarding the economy. Compromising those industries jeopardizes a $1.1 billion industry and the production of three key Utah minerals, including magnesium, of which the state is North America’s No. 1 producer due to US Magnesium.
The report also says raising the berm that separates the north arm and the south arm of the Great Salt Lake — a step already approved by the state Legislature and endorsed via executive order by Gov. Spencer Cox — should be a top priority to tackle the egregious salinity levels that are impacting the south arm and threatening to wipe out an entire aquatic ecosystem.Gov.
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