Activity 2.2 – Hydrosphere

    

   Great Salt Lake September 1999

   Nature.org The Nature Conservancy (2021)

 
    Great Salt Lake 2016
    Nature.org The Nature Conservancy (2021)

 
  Great Salt Lake July 2017
  Google Earth (2017)

The Great Salt Lake, Utah. 1999-2017
Problem

The Great Salt Lake in the state of Utah has been slowly shrinking for many decades. In the pictures shown above we can see the receding edges and the progression of the areas of lakebed being gradually exposed in different parts of the lake. The third photo, taken in 2017, shows all that is left of the lake. As a result, Salt Lake city, populated by more than 70% of all of the state of Utah’s inhabitants, and other areas near the shrinking lake, are in extreme danger of respiratory disease. This is due to the extremely toxic dust clouds containing high levels of arsenic and other poisons emitting from the exposed lake bed.

Explanation

Global warming is the cause for most of the world’s droughts and drying bodies of water and the southwest part of the United States has already begun to experience the detrimental consequences. Because of the extremely hot temperatures, a larger amount of melting snow is being evaporated rather than turning into liquid and flowing into the nearby rivers fed by the Great Salt Lake. This means that there is not only less water flowing into the Great Salt Lake but also less water for the residents and farmers of the state of Utah. What used to be a 8547 km^2 lake has now shrunk to less than 2590 km^2 (Flavelle, NYtimes 2022) and some fear it may not be long before it disappears completely.

There are countless negative consequences of the drying of the Great Salt Lake. Nearby plants and wildlife could go extinct, forcing birds and other animals that formerly inhabited the area elsewhere. If the shrinking of The Great Salt Lake continues, Utah and its residents could be greatly affected and in danger of experiencing toxic dust storms, agricultural complications, extreme deteriorating in air quality, and therefore likely experience a huge population decline in the near future.


References:

The Nature Conservancy Nature.org (2022) Will we choose to save The Great Salt Lake? https://www.nature.org/en-us/about-us/where-we-work/united-states/utah/stories-in-utah/will-we-save-the-great-salt-lake/

Google Maps (2017) The Great Salt Lake, Utah. Retrieved from https://earth.google.com/web/search/great+salt+lake/@41.13002229,-112.51013515,1288.29307508a,132348.87768416d,35y,162.8032099h,74.10164721t,0r/data=CigiJgokCcw9WsrPuERAEYXaL1uxlURAGY6ULIKMgV7AIRViyVqkkF7A

Derouin (2017) Science.org https://www.science.org/content/article/utah-s-great-salt-lake-has-lost-half-its-water-thanks-thirsty-humans