Nine years from now, critics and fans alike will have their eyes focused on Utah as billions of people around the world will tune in for the 2034 Winter Olympics. Like cleaning up your home for guests, the state is preparing now for thousands of visitors in an attempt to showcase what makes Utah the top state in the country year after year according to U.S. News & World Report.

One of Utah’s most iconic landmarks, the Great Salt Lake, has become the focus of a collaborative effort by scientists, environmentalists and state lawmakers as they attempt to restore this vital water resource for Utah — and the greater Rocky Mountain West.

At a newsmaker event co-hosted by the University of Utah’s Kem C. Gardner Institute and Utah State University’s Janet Quinney Lawson Institute for Land, Water and Air on Tuesday, Gardner Institute Director Natalie Gochnour asked panelists what a success story for the lake would look like nine years from now.

All four panelists, including Gochnour, belong to the Great Salt Lake Strike Team, a collective from Utah universities, government departments and other entities, ensuring the latest research on the Great Salt Lake is being considered in decision-making regarding the lake.

Paul Brooks, a professor of geology and geophysics at the University of Utah, hopes that Utah’s efforts now and in the coming years will demonstrate that Utahns realize water is the No. 1 thing that unites people.

“From everything we do, from these little water bottles, to our drinks, to our lawns, to our agriculture, our food, our skiing, our migratory wildlife, water is what unites us,” he said. “We recognize that, and we’re coming together to address it.”

Brooks added that Utah has all the tools to successfully show the world how to manage water resources.

“We can show how to get it done,” and other civilizations can mirror Utah in cultivating their agriculture, wildlife and developing urban environments through joint efforts.

“That’s the story that I want to see,” Brooks said, “(That) Utah got it right.”

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The lake’s 2024 milestones

William Anderegg, director of the Wilkes Center for Climate Science and Policy at the University of Utah, said that after two years of heavy snowfall, the Great Salt Lake water levels have returned to a healthier state similar to those before the 2021 and 2022 droughts.

The latest Great Salt Lake Data and Insights Summary report by the GSL Strike Team showed that reservoir storage in the Great Salt Lake basin hit its lowest level — since 2005 — in November 2022, at just 36.3% capacity. Last July, reservoir storage reached 91.6% after two wet winter seasons, before declining to 73.4% in October.

“Precipitation has roughly been flat on average over the past 120 years,” meaning it has no lasting statistical trend, Anderegg said. “What has not been flat is temperature.”

The climate in northern Utah has increased by 2 degrees Fahrenheit since the 1980s and is expected to increase by 11 degrees before the turn of the century. After accounting for climate factors and human water consumption, Anderegg explained that the GSL’s main watersheds (the Bear, Jordan, and Weber rivers) have shown an increase in depletion trends since detailed measuring was recorded in 1989, adding to the risk of potentially losing benefits the lake creates.

The positive aspect is that, although Utah’s population has doubled in the last 35 years, municipal and industrial water use has remained relatively the same.

“I think this is some reason for hope,” Anderegg said. “It tells us we can grow in Utah and not use more water. We can be innovative. We can conserve and still shepherd it and use our water resources wisely.”

Brian Steed, co-chair of the Great Salt Lake Strike Team and Great Salt Lake Commissioner, said that during the most recent droughts, he participated in taking Utah legislators on a helicopter tour of the Great Salt Lake.

An experience he said he would never forget.

“We were in the midst of the drought. We saw just record lows on our reservoir levels. We saw, you know, dust and other impacts,” Steed said. “That experience is mind-blowing and life-changing because you don’t realize the scope and scale of what the Great Salt Lake and the magnitude of what we’re dealing with until you get up and see it in person and experience it.”

Steed credited the multiple tours he’s taken with the state legislature and members of the federal government as the catalyst for state and national investment and policy changes regarding the Great Salt Lake.

“We now have in the state of Utah the most forward-thinking and forward-looking laws on the books that give us, as users of water, policymakers, and decision-makers, (the) tools to make good decisions. No other state in the west or in the country has the ability to do what we can do in Utah, and it’s an incredible thing.”

The Great Salt Lake in the 2025 legislative session

As Utah lawmakers prepare for the 2025 legislative session, the GSL Strike team recommended the following potential policy lifts in their report:

Greater incentives: The state should explore incentives for water rights holders, which Joel Ferry, executive director of Utah’s Department of Natural Resources, said is vital, especially for local ranchers and farmers.

“We’ve seen farmers are willing to uptake conservation programs, measures and water use when there’s some financial assistance and they can afford to do it. They know it’s the right thing to do. “(Although) It’s not easy (and) it’s a big investment,” he said.

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The most significant factor contributing to water depletion in the Great Salt Lake basin is agricultural use, followed by municipal and industrial use and mineral extraction. But for everyone else, “we’ve got to be really internalizing (our water use) as well” to help these industries as they face water challenges, Ferry said.

Secondary metering donations: Conservancy districts, which manage water resources for specific areas, could use the water savings achieved through subsidized secondary metering programs — which track water usage for irrigation or non-potable purposes — to help the Great Salt Lake.

Districts could file a change application to officially allocate a portion of the conserved water to the lake’s benefit rather than using it for other purposes, which would involve legally reassigning the use of the saved water to support the lake’s ecosystem.

Dedication to effluent: Cities can better conserve their water to prepare for a potential drought, “offset future demands and commit a commensurate amount of treated sewage effluent that would otherwise be available for reuse,” per the report.

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