The Great Salt Lake and its concerning future has a lot of nurses and doctors attending to its ailing condition.
What does the lake’s health mean for Utah? Our identity for sure. What about the birds, the extraction industries and the impact on snowmelt and the shoreline dust that could make us sick?
Researchers and local media are stepping up. So are federal agencies. It may be a lake that is stinky and shallow, but like the shovel you cannot find — you will want it when you need it.
The U.S. Geological Survey has been infused with $3 million to place stream gauges to monitor the lake and they put them in place on Monday.
“It will help us establish better understand the kind of baseline flows that are going into the lake under different conditions, rather than guessing what’s coming. You know what’s getting to the lake,” said Tim Davis, Great Salt Lake deputy commissioner.
“These 13 gauges. And then, you know, the additional water measurement infrastructure that will go in place in the next couple years will help us be able to measure what’s already getting to the lake.”
“As people can serve, dedicate and deliver water to the lake, be able to be to ensure that that those increased flows are able to make it to the lake, and that they’re helping us meet a baseline conservation target,” Davis said.
The USGS funding can augment that effort with the science it brings to the game.
