Sunrise light on a grove of tufa towers emerging from the water of Mono Lake with soft green and dusty-red wild grasses in the foreground, Canada geese in the shallow water with reflections of the rocky towers, and desert hills in the distance.

Los Angeles and Great Basin Air Pollution Control District reach agreement about Owens Valley dust

Sunrise light on a grove of tufa towers emerging from the water of Mono Lake with soft green and dusty-red wild grasses in the foreground, Canada geese in the shallow water with reflections of the rocky towers, and desert hills in the distance.

After decades of negotiations over controlling dust storms at Owens Lake an agreement has been reached for how to proceed into the future.

The agreement will allow the Los Angeles Department of Water & Power (DWP) to use a nearly waterless dust control method on Owens Lake, and it also provides DWP with certainty about how many acres of the dry lakebed will ever have to be controlled for dust. For the Great Basin Air Pollution Control District, the agreement offers a way forward that will ensure cleaner air for the people and the environment of the Eastern Sierra.

Read the LA Times‘ full article here: New dust-busting method ends LA’s longtime feud with Owens Valley

Dust-control methods at Owens Lake include shallow flooding, gravel spreading, and tilling up clods of clay. Photo by Elin Ljung.

4 Comments

  1. Great photo, Elin! How does this decision impact the work of the Audubon society and others advocating for bird habitat – as presented by our Refreshologist this last summer?

  2. Please summarize protections for the snowy plovers, avocets, and stilts on the front page of the e-newsletter.

  3. NO WAY. Use water as part of it, if not all, as that ensures the quality of life for marsh animals and birds around the lake. Cement that bottom or some of BS is useless, except to let LA fill its swimming pools more. LA should start building and using desalination plants. Hey, if the countries around the Persian Gulf can do it for such a huge area why can’t LA and surrounding areas. For once make them pay for what the water they steal from us really costs in money and especially environmental costs.

  4. Raymond, actually Mike Prather who is an Audubon person has been very involved with this. The mounded ditches are actually keeping water available for birds between them at least that is the hope. Dear MLC please keep us posted on this. Of course this is still a theft of native land and water.