Water level in the Great Salt Lake (GSL) basin has steadily fallen from 1847 to half its original volume today even though annual rainfall has remained constant over that time.
The GSL has lost 25 million acre feet of water to date plus 50 million acre feet of subjacent groundwater. This is because of continuing diversion of fresh water for an ever-growing population as well as immigration (and alfalfa farming).
Some Utahns want to refill the GSL by diverting valuable fresh water into the salty lake (27% salt), which fresh water is in limited supply in drought-stricken Utah. (This in contrast to the dumping of tens of billions of raw sewage water into the GSL through the 1960s.)
Now some Republican legislators blame the evil Wasatch Mountain forests for “gobbling up” water that they claim rightfully belongs in their revered GSL. A Salt Lake County Council member said (The Tribune, Jan. 19) “watershed restoration is the key to saving the lake … Utah’s forests … are largely overgrown and frequently unhealthy … contain 7.6 billion trees … are consuming trillions of gallons of water that would otherwise flow downstream to the (GSL) … thinning of those same trees would restore over 1.5 million acre-feet of water per year to the Great Salt Lake … active (tree) management includes mechanical means, prescribed burns and logging overgrowth.” So Utah is proposing accelerated destruction of trees and other green lifeforms which sequester CO2, the same flavor CO2 facilitating climate change.
People around the world are overrunning fresh water resources. People around the world are now working to devise ways to desalinate sea water, not to make salt water. People around the world are now planting trees to help moderate atmospheric water, soil water evaporation, and sequester CO2, not cut them down.
The wonder of the GSL basin is not its salty water but the nine fresh water waterfowl wetlands peripheral to the GSL which constitute a third of Utah’s wetlands. Fresh water flowing into the GSL should be redirected and used exclusively to flood and expand its famous flyway stopover and essential wetland habitat for millions of waterfowl.
H. Richard Klatt, Sandy
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