A solution to Great Salt Lake’s algal blooms? Pipe wastewater to where the brine shrimp graze.

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As summer approaches, add toxic algal blooms to the long list of the Great Salt Lake’s troubles stemming from climate change, growth and the Wasatch Front’s unchecked water consumption.

. They are so widespread that the state recently updated its limits for phosphorus discharge in treated wastewater.

“It took a lot of thinking and evaluation,” said Mackey. “But really, Gilbert Bay ... doesn’t have the types of environmental issues we’re concerned with.” “When you have a clean water source and you have demand for that water, the water is usually going to flow to where that demand is,” DenBleyker said, especially when communities are shelling out millions to clean it up. “What that means is that their discharge to Great Salt Lake would be eliminated.”

Dense stands of invasive phragmites have sprung up along the district’s current discharge canal. The thirsty plants gobble up around a fifth of the 20 million gallons North Davis releases each day, according to Cowan’s calculations, before it flows to the lake. Brine shrimp in Gilbert Bay depend on nutrient flows from fresher bays, grazing so heavily on the ensuing phytoplankton that the waters. The pipeline project will ensure those nutrients make it to the shrimp, even as the lake continues to shrink.

 

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