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submitted 10 months ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

Environmental and community groups have sued Utah officials over failures to save its iconic Great Salt Lake from irreversible collapse.

The largest saltwater lake in the western hemisphere has been steadily shrinking, as more and more water has been diverted away from the lake to irrigate farmland, feed industry and water lawns. A megadrought across the US south-west, accelerated by global heating, has hastened the lake’s demise.

Unless dire action is taken, the lake could decline beyond recognition within five years, a report published early this year warned, exposing a dusty lakebed laced with arsenic, mercury, lead and other toxic substances. The resulting toxic dustbowl would be “one of the worst environmental disasters in modern US history”, the ecologist Ben Abbott of Brigham Young University told the Guardian earlier this year.

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[-] GlitzyArmrest@lemmy.world 54 points 10 months ago

Went through UT earlier this summer and was amazed to see that unlike here in Seattle, all of their lawns were a deep green. In a desert.

[-] Ryumast3r@lemmy.world 33 points 9 months ago

Lawns aren't really the issue for utah. Agriculture uses something like 70+% of the water, and a lot of that is flood irrigation or other inefficient irrigation. The water is mostly used for crops like alfalfa that get exported to places like China.

The governor, unsurprisingly, is heavily invested in alfalfa farming, so do the math.

[-] Wogi@lemmy.world 24 points 9 months ago

Utah uses an astronomical amount of water when compared to other states. Residential water use is the single greatest non agricultural use of water in the state. I'm going to go out on a limb and say the green lawns might be a contributing factor.

Agricultural water use is a problem, sure. In a state that has very little water maybe growing plants that need a lot of it is a bad idea. Why wouldn't this apply to grass as well?

[-] renownedballoonthief@lemmygrad.ml -2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Alfalfa exports are a small portion compared to domestic livestock consumption. The answer now, as always, is that people should go vegan.

[-] Bayz0r@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago

And unfortunately that still gets you downvotes, despite being the one contribution practically everyone can make themselves instantly.

[-] expatriado@lemmy.world 41 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

should rename the state's capital to Salt City

[-] Fedizen@lemmy.world 22 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Arsenic Dust City has a ring to it though

[-] Zron@lemmy.world 11 points 9 months ago

“Come to Arsenic Dust City where the girls are coughing and the men are coughing and oh my god is that blood”

[-] doppelgangmember@lemmy.world 1 points 9 months ago

Just arsenic!

C'mon down!

[-] bradorsomething@ttrpg.network 12 points 10 months ago

Salt Flake City

[-] jray4559@lemmy.sdf.org 26 points 10 months ago

Yeah, but who's going to stop the music of growth? Certainly not any politician that wants to keep being elected.

The average person doesn't really care about sustainable living, they just wanna be able to keep their golf courses and SUV's and everything else wasteful. If the lake dies, they'll just take water from further north. Thus, nothing will change, and we lose more and more of our limited freshwater.

[-] lolcatnip@reddthat.com 15 points 10 months ago

The lake bed will stop it soon enough.

[-] jray4559@lemmy.sdf.org 14 points 10 months ago

I'd hope for that, but there's also probably at least a 50/50 chance that Utah strong-arms the federal government into letting them have water from Wyoming and Montana up north. Or, god forbid, they get a Great Lakes pipeline.

[-] Fedizen@lemmy.world 23 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

I can't believe the woke mormon university is once again trying to defame small business agricorps yet again for just hosing down their hogs. /s

[-] SeaJ@lemm.ee 16 points 9 months ago

They should just pray for more rain like the governor suggested.

[-] TokenBoomer@lemmy.world 11 points 10 months ago
[-] Copythis@lemmy.world 6 points 9 months ago

Just become republican!

All of a sudden, everything bad is a hoax.

Problem solved.

this post was submitted on 07 Sep 2023
303 points (99.7% liked)

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