1. Great Salt Lake Water Quality Strategy Update
Jake Vander Laan
November 16, 2017

2. DWQ’s Vision for Great Salt Lake
Provide important recreational, ecological, and economic benefits for current and future generations.
Photograph Courtesy of Charles Uibel - greatsaltlakephotos.com

3. GSL Background Ecological importance
Migratory and nesting bird populations
Unique resident biota
Brine shrimp
Brine flies
Wetlands
Microbialites
Economic importance ($1.3 billion annually)
Human health – air quality

4. Background
GSL is cooperatively managed: State and federal agencies, input from private stakeholders
Causeways divide the lake into 4 main bays, water chemistry and biota vary

5. Clean Water Act & GSL Clean Water Act (1972) Objective:
“Restore and maintain the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the Nation’s waters.”
Establishes structure for:
Establishing water quality standards
Assessing beneficial use attainment
Regulating pollutant discharges

6. Clean Water Act & GSL
1. Identify Beneficial Uses for Water Bodies 2. Identify Water Quality Standards to meet Beneficial Uses 3. Regulate Point Source Discharges 4. Monitor Water Quality 5. Assess waters (305b Integrated Report) and List (303d list) waters that do not meet Water Quality Standards 6. Identify sources and necessary reductions of pollutants. Identify a plan to reduce pollutants – feeds back to regulation

7. Clean Water Act & GSL Define beneficial uses Monitor water quality
Reduce pollution sources
Identify pollution sources
Assess use support

8. GSL Beneficial Uses Primary and secondary contact recreation
Waterfowl, shore birds and other water-oriented wildlife including their necessary food chain

9. Clean Water Act & GSL Define beneficial uses Water quality criteria
Monitor water quality
Define beneficial uses
Reduce pollution sources
Identify pollution sources
Assess use support
Water quality criteria

10. Clean Water Act & GSL Additional challenges :
Analytical methods for hypersaline waters
Lack of baseline water quality data
Presence of unique organisms with unknown toxicity responses

11. Water Quality Standards
Numeric Standard:
Measurable level of a particular chemical or conditions allowable in a water body
Gilbert Bay Selenium egg tissue criterion (12.5 mg/kg dry wt)
Others in development
Narrative Standard:
Narrative statement that establishes water quality goals and makes significant negative impacts on water quality illegal

12. Utah’s Narrative Water Quality Standard
“It shall be unlawful, and a violation of these rules, for any person to discharge or place any waste or other substance in such a way as will be or may become offensive such as:
unnatural deposits, floating debris, oil, scum or other nuisances such as color, odor or taste;
or cause conditions which produce undesirable aquatic life or which produce objectionable tastes in edible aquatic organisms;
or result in concentrations or combinations of substances which produce undesirable physiological responses in desirable resident fish, or other desirable aquatic life,
or undesirable human health effects,
as determined by bioassay or other tests performed in accordance with standard procedures; or determined by biological assessments in Subsection R ”

13. GSL Water Quality Strategy
Strategic monitoring
Recreational use criteria
Aquatic life use criteria
Nutrient assessment
Wetland program

14. GSL Water Quality Strategy
Strategic monitoring
Recreational use criteria
Aquatic life use criteria
Nutrient assessment
Wetland program
September 2014

15. GSL Water Quality Strategy
Progress Report

16. Baseline Monitoring Program
Implemented 2011
Biannual monitoring at 11 sites
Goals:
Establish baseline conditions
Detect potential changes in pollutant concentrations

17. Baseline Monitoring Program
Water chemistry:
Nutrients
Metals (Se, Hg, and others)
Chlorophyll-a
Biological monitoring:
Brine shrimp
Bird eggs
Metal concentrations (Se, Hg, and others)

18. Interim Permitting Program
Development of numeric criteria for all priority pollutants will take many years
Interim permitting approach to protect GSL
Preliminary screening of pollutant concentrations against freshwater criteria
Whole effluent toxicity testing
Technology based effluent limits

19. Interim Permitting Program
Applied to all GSL dischargers
Permits have not been appealed since implementation

20. Standards Development
Selenium standard:
Adopted in 2008
5+ years of development
Most sensitive endpoint: bird reproduction
12.5 mg/kg dry weight in bird egg tissue
Monitoring and assessment:
Bird eggs collected as part of baseline monitoring program
Assessed annually against selenium criterion

21. Standards Development
Toxicity testing:
Brine shrimp and brine flies
Arsenic
Copper
Lead
Laying ground work for future testing and standards

22. Toxicity Testing

23. Toxicity Testing

24. Metal concentration (ug/L)
Toxicity Testing
Metal concentration (ug/L)
Survival rate (%)

25. Baseline Monitoring Results: Bird Eggs

26. Baseline Monitoring Results: Bird Eggs

27. Baseline Monitoring Results: Bird Eggs

28. Baseline Monitoring Results: Bird Eggs

29. GSL Water Quality Strategy
Future Directions

30. Wetland Component

31. Wetland Component Conservation action plan meetings
Ongoing GSL wetland work:
Conservation action plan meetings
Beneficial use definitions
Use assessment methods
Water quality standards
Numeric
Narrative

32. Nutrient Component What are nutrients? Why do we care?
Any element required for production in an ecosystem
Typically Nitrogen and Phosphorus in aquatic ecosystems
Necessary ecosystem components, but
Human activities can alter nutrient abundance
Why do we care?
Food-web alterations (when, where, and how much production)
Can determine which organisms succeed
Potential impacts on dissolved oxygen, pH, and other WQ parameters

33. Nutrient Component Need for GSL Nutrient Component:
Point and non-point nutrient sources in GSL watershed
Urban and agricultural land uses
Municipal and industrial discharges
Potential for nutrient load alterations, potential for ecological impacts
Unique and valuable ecosystem
Currently no nutrient criteria or assessment methods for GSL

34. Nutrients in GSL What do we know (or expect)? Terminal basin
Relatively large internal nutrient pool and high nutrient concentrations
Accumulation of organic material and importance of internal processing
GSL bays components may have different responses to nutrients
Spatial and temporal variation in nutrient concentrations

35. Gilbert Bay Surface Nutrients
Nutrients in GSL
Gilbert Bay Surface Nutrients
Total N (mg/L)
Total P (mg/L)
*Data from USGS NWIS

36. Nutrients in GSL What do we want to know?
GSL nutrient budget: inputs, exports, internal cycling and processing
Representativeness and applicability of existing research
Analytical method consistency
Nitrogen and phosphorus
Chlorophyll
Dissolved oxygen, pH, and other potentially nutrient-related parameters
Nutrient impacts on different ecosystem components
Pelagic food webs
Benthic food webs
Wetlands
Nutrient impacts: when, where, and how much?

37. QUESTIONS?