The Not So Great Salt Lake: Yet Another Victim of Climate Change

Over the 4th of July weekend, I had the chance to visit The Great Salt Lake. But what I found at the Salt Lake can only be described as saddening and depressing.

As I kid, I learned about the lake after watching the famous matchups between the Jordan era Bulls as they took on the Utah Jazz in the NBA Finals. The Great Salt Lake sounded like such interesting place to visit with a unique natural feature found in very few other places on Earth.

The supposed “Great” Salt Lake can only now be described as “Mediocre” at best. In fact, the lake has shrunk by over two thirds of its once “Great” size last seen in the 1980s. As the lake dries up, it leaves beyond the clear sign of where it once extended to. As the water evaporates, the salt is left behind leaving wide expanses of white ground.

During my visit, I camped on Antelope Island, which was once the largest island in the lake. Though due to the shrinkage of the lake and emerging land bridge, it’s been many years since it has been a true island.

The weather there was torturously hot, topping over 100 degrees Fahrenheit. From a scientific standpoint, the lake should act as massive evaporative cooler during the summer, cooling the surrounding area as the air absorbs the moisture from the lake. Though this is now only acting at one third its original cooling capacity, further amplifying the warming effects of climate change in the area.

Following my visit and reading further, I have since learned that the reduction in water volume is set to unleash what the New York Times calls an “Environmental Nuclear Bomb” in the coming years. As the wind erodes the hard, salted crust left behind by the water, it will start to expose arsenic and other heavy metals hidden underneath, which will eventually be picked up by the strong mountain winds and carry them into the heavily populated Salt Lake City urban area.

I saw the salty remains of this once great lake as a glaringly obvious example of climate change. It’s not something that’s coming. It’s here. This is especially so in the Western United States, where the drought keeps getting worse and worse every year. Yet we as a people still we don’t act, even in the face of all the scientifically predicted, hellish forecasts now coming true, year after year.

Meanwhile, our elected officials and our corporate “leaders” continue to fail us. How bad does the situation need to get before they stop lining their pockets getting rich off the status quo and start to act on the future? Will it take an entire city breathing in arsenic on a regular basis? Or dying of heatstroke? Or people forced to move from the places we each call home as our water supplies fully dry up?

I’ve been working towards solving climate change for most of my professional career. And one thing people often bring up as a reason not to act is how big the problem is. How can you possibly make a difference in the face of such a monstrous problem?

And then I read that just 100 global companies are responsible for 71% of global emissions. So maybe the problem isn’t as big as they want us to believe. If just 100 companies lead by 100 “leaders” can get us into this problem. Maybe a handful of true leaders can lead us out the other side.

The 4th of July is usually a time when so many American families come together to barbeque, embrace the summer, and celebrate or shared history. But for me I’m left with so many mixed feelings. How can I be truly proud of our nation when it’s so easy to look through the façade and see so many leaders that only seem to care about campaign contributions and maximizing shareholder value?

But the history of America is also rooted in rebelling against a strong power that is wrongfully imposing its might to extract profits at the cost of the people. I would argue one of the most American thing you can do is to find your voice and use it to make peoples lives better. This is at least the America I would be proud to be a citizen of.

I have a lot of thoughts on what the rest of us can do to help solve the problem, which I will continue to share moving forward, because first and foremost, the answer is to NOT BE QUIET. If you’re confident, capable, and have the privilege to do so, RAISE YOUR VOICE. Or if you don’t feel comfortable, help amplify the voices of those who have this privilege. Get out and vote for true leaders that will ACT. And push the leaders that you have to do more and be more so we can solve this together.