Science, Space and Technology News 2024
Research highlights that dust stirred by desert winds from the exposed Salton Sea bed significantly increases air pollution, disproportionately affecting nearby disadvantaged communities. The situation has worsened due to reduced water inflows, a consequence of water diversions for urban use in San Diego. Credit: SciTechDaily.com
Imperial, which supplies water to vast desert farms as well as seven towns and two special districts, is the largest user of Colorado River water. The agreement with San Diego required agricultural water users to increase efficiency and reduce their water consumption, which reduced water running into the Salton Sea, Edwards said.
Researchers modeled lakebed exposure by dividing the lake’s shoreline into 1-square-kilometer grids and collected air pollution data daily for over 20 years, from 1998 to 2018. They added data about the exposed lakebed, or playa, and used a sophisticated physics model called HYSPLIT to factor in wind levels and particle size to track the movement of dust over time.
In the paper, the pollution paths are depicted on a map of the state. The Salton Sea is marked with a black dot, and red lines radiate from there to distances of 100 miles or more. “There’s lots of evidence that playa is particularly emissive in terms of dust,” Edwards said. “If it’s dry, those particles get picked up readily by the wind and create dust — and at rates higher than areas that have been exposed to the wind over long periods of time.”Edwards said policymakers and regulators should consider the health and environmental impacts of water diversions in their decision-making.
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