On a recent flight home to Salt Lake City, I gazed out the window and shuddered. The ground below was riddled with cracks. Sporadic green pools dotted the dry earth where vast water had once been.
I was flying over what used to be an outlying stretch of the Great Salt Lake — the largest lake west of the Mississippi River. Growing up, I used to row there with my crew team. I came to love the brilliant sunsets, along with the migratory birds that stopped there each year.
This was not the lake I once knew.
For years, Great Salt Lake has been shrinking due to water overuse and rising temperatures. It has gone from a high of 3,300 square miles in the 1980s to a record low of 888 square miles in 2022. Though a few years of heavy precipitation have helped, it is still in grave danger. Without meaningful change, the lake could vanish altogether in a matter of years.
This is not just a disaster for Utah, where the lake is a cornerstone — it could have wide-reaching impacts that could reach New England.
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Great Salt Lake is the foundation of northern Utah’s ecosystem. Its water evaporates and may fall as rain or snow, helping to sustain life nearby, including in Salt Lake City. Precipitation, and mountain snowmelt in particular, return water to the lake.
Now, the cycle is faltering. Thanks to warming temperatures, snowpack is turning to water vapor, reducing the amount that flows into Utah’s rivers and, eventually, the lake. Population growth means more and more water is diverted from the lake’s tributaries. None of this is good news: No other saline lake in the world has recovered after its water levels have declined like this.
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If the lake disappears, it would not only wreck ecosystems but also poison the Salt Lake Valley. Industrial waste dumped into the lake has contributed to dangerous amounts of heavy metals. As water levels drop, windstorms blow over stretches of exposed lakebed and carry arsenic-laden dust into Salt Lake City and elsewhere.
“I’ve got lung problems from the dust coming from the lake,” says Steve Clyde, a lawyer who has spent decades working on Utah water issues. My own family has been affected, too: When an unexpected storm blew dust into Salt Lake City while my mom was mountain biking, she inhaled it and passed out on a cliffside.
A desiccated lake could harm more than just Utahns. Particulate matter from its dry lakebed, such as PM2.5 — tiny dust capable of entering your lungs and bloodstream, where it can trigger respiratory illness and heart attacks — can be carried thousands of miles by the wind. In fact, PM2.5 has been recorded traveling over 1,000 miles in just two days and can linger in the air for weeks.
Dust clouds have even been known to travel between continents. Just last month, dust blown from the Sahara Desert polluted Florida’s skies.
Ben Abbott, an ecology professor at Brigham Young University, says dust from Great Salt Lake could wreak havoc over thousands of miles. At similar lakes, such Mar Chiquita Lake in Argentina or the dried-up Owens Lake in California, he’s seen dust plumes “affect soil health and public health at a very large scale.” Great Salt Lake is larger than either of those, so its consequences could be worse.
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New Englanders are familiar with air quality problems originating far away: In recent years, dangerous particulate matter from Canadian wildfires have affected the region. Meanwhile, the fish industry could also be hurt: The lake supplies more than one-third of the world’s brine shrimp — a top food source for fish farming.
To save it, more water must reach the lake — about 33 percent above current levels — according to the Great Salt Lake Strike Team, which includes researchers from Utah State University and the University of Utah, as well as state officials. The group believes this can be done by shepherding conserved water to the lake and working with the agricultural industry to reduce water use or lease water rights from farmers.
New Englanders concerned about potential impacts on air quality can consider asking their congressional representatives to get involved. Brian Steed, Utah’s governor-appointed Great Salt Lake commissioner, says his state would “absolutely welcome any assistance” from leaders here.
In 2024, the House and Senate overwhelmingly passed the Great Salt Lake Stewardship Act — inspired by an earlier bill sponsored by Mitt Romney — which authorizes funding for water conservation in the lake’s basin. But saving Great Salt Lake requires more. Action is needed to manage dust hotspots and ensure that conserved water actually reaches the lake.
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Flying over what’s left of the lake, childhood memories cycled through my mind. Growing up, it was always there — just as the White Mountains and Lake Winnipesaukee are fixtures of life here. The fact that it could disappear felt absurd. But there it was, vanishing in real time.
“Oftentimes, people think of Great Salt Lake as a Utah problem,” Steed says. “In reality, it’s an international one.”
He’s right. Because if the lake vanishes, the impact would be felt not only by Utahns, but people building lives and memories wherever they are.
Adelaide Parker can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on X @adelaide_prkr.
Adelaide Parker can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on X @adelaide_prkr.