Salton Sea: Let It Die or Rescue It? (San Diego, Coachella: 2015, school)

[Elliott_CA]

According to the L.A. Times, the Salton Sea will reach a point of no return environmentally in 2017 as it becomes a smelly and toxic soup. The Salton Sea is not a natural lake. It's a manmade accident that occurred in 1905 when the Colorado River overtopped a levee for an irrigation canal, spilling unchecked for 18 months into desert lowlands. The lake is shrinking and becoming increasingly salty. Gov. Brown signed a bill to "protect" the Salton Sea but the stop-gap measures seem to be more like palliative care versus all-out restoration.

Do we divert precious water into the lake to try to offset evaporation? Or do we let nature take its course and let the lake shrivel up and die?

[BayAreaHillbilly]

Originally Posted by Elliott_CA

According to the L.A. Times, the Salton Sea will reach a point of no return environmentally in 2017 as it becomes a smelly and toxic soup. The Salton Sea is not a natural lake. It's a manmade accident that occurred in 1905 when the Colorado River overtopped a levee for an irrigation canal, spilling unchecked for 18 months into desert lowlands. The lake is shrinking and becoming increasingly salty. Gov. Brown signed a bill to "protect" the Salton Sea but the stop-gap measures seem to be more like palliative care versus all-out restoration.

Do we divert precious water into the lake to try to offset evaporation? Or do we let nature take its course and let the lake shrivel up and die?

At some point it will rise again. These things come in cycles.

[nightlysparrow]

I was out there not too long ago. I could not get the smell out of my nose for hours.

[genjy]

I wonder if we could turn it in a big ass landfill when it dries up.

That way, the nasty bottom sediment would get buried, and we would also get a landfill that we need.

[Elliott_CA]

The poll oversimplifies the situation: accelerating the decline of the Salton Sea is a water agreement where San Diego obtains water that otherwise would have flowed into the Salton

"Imperial Valley agreed to stop farming — and, most importantly, watering — 50,000 acres and ship that water instead to San Diego and the Coachella Valley for residential use. In exchange, the urban areas paid for water conservation efforts in the Imperial Valley, such as lining canals and installing drip irrigation systems. The deal also called for 32 billion gallons of water a year to be piped directly into the Salton Sea to offset the loss in runoff from the 50,000 acres of fallowed farm fields. But that spigot is scheduled to be closed at the end of 2017, and the date looms like a hard deadline for ecological disaster." (link)

[expatCA]

Originally Posted by Elliott_CA

The poll oversimplifies the situation: accelerating the decline of the Salton Sea is a water agreement where San Diego obtains water that otherwise would have flowed into the Salton

"Imperial Valley agreed to stop farming — and, most importantly, watering — 50,000 acres and ship that water instead to San Diego and the Coachella Valley for residential use. In exchange, the urban areas paid for water conservation efforts in the Imperial Valley, such as lining canals and installing drip irrigation systems. The deal also called for 32 billion gallons of water a year to be piped directly into the Salton Sea to offset the loss in runoff from the 50,000 acres of fallowed farm fields. But that spigot is scheduled to be closed at the end of 2017, and the date looms like a hard deadline for ecological disaster." (link)

Sounds like a good deal for everyone.

What ecological disaster, it wasn't a lake that far back in time before the water that spilled in created a ... ecological disaster for the land and fauna and habitat it is now on.

[backstreetsbackALLRIGHT]

Was there back in May (twice)....one of the oddest experiences ever, never seen anything like it. I'm intrigued by the whole Salton Sea story and have watched the documentary. It's just so interesting to me.

It didn't smell when we were there, so we must've went on a good day. But the flies! OMG.

[V8 Vega]

Move LA's homeless there, their already accoustemed to the smell and the flies

[MarciaMarshaMarcia]

I can actually remember when it was used as a resort, & schoolmates of mine went there to water ski

[CamaroGuy]

They need to scrap the bullet train and put some of the yen for the Salton Sea's restoration if you ask me.