PI-39 Commonly Asked Questions About Utah's Great Salt Lake and Ancient Lake Bonneville

Top photo: Breach in the SPTC causeway, near Lakeside, looking northeast. Photo by P.A. Sturm.
Bottom photo: Close-up view of first waters flowing through the breach opening.

What was done about the flooding
that occurred around Great Salt Lake during the 1980s?

In 1983, the level of Great Salt Lake began to rise, due to above-average annual precipitation.  By 1986, the lake rose nearly 12 feet to reach its historic high of 4,211.85 feet.  The high lake level caused serious flooding which resulted in millions of dollars in property damage, especially around the south arm of the lake.

Flooding disrupted major highway and railroad traffic; inundated mineral-industry solar ponds, roads, beaches, farms, boating facilities and state/federal waterfowl management areas; and threatened water-treatment plants.

In 1984, after studying numerous flood-control alternatives, the State of Utah implemented its first flood-control project by breaching the SPTC causeway.  The breach consisted of a 300-foot-long bridge-covered opening in the causeway near Lakeside, which allowed the rapid flow of south-arm water into the north arm.

Top photo: West Desert pumping plant. Water was pumped from the north arm of the lake through a 4.1-mile-long canal to the 320,000-acre West Pond.
Bottom photo: Close-up view of the pumping plant with one of the three 1,000 cubic-feet-per-second pumps in operation (view looking east).

Prior to the breach, the elevation of the south arm was over 3.5 feet higher than the north arm.  Completed at a cost of about 3.5 million dollars, the project lowered the south arm of the lake by nearly one foot and raised the north arm by about 1.5 feet, within about two months.

The lake continued to rise after the causeway breach was completed, forcing the State to implement its second flood-control alternative, pumping water from the lake into the West Desert.

Three large pumps installed on the western shore of the lake pumped water via a 4.1-mile-long canal to the West Pond.  The pumping project filled the 320,000-acre West Pond with over 800,000 acre-feet of water and greatly increased the net evaporation from the lake.  The West Desert Pumping Project was completed at a cost of more than $60 million.

For more than two years, starting in 1987, water was pumped from the north arm of the lake into the  West Pond evaporation area in the west desert.  During the 26-month life of the project, more than 2.7 million acre-feet of water were pumped, which contained about 695 million tons of salt.

The pumps are currently not in use but are maintained in ready condition should the lake rise again.