The new price tag for restoring the Salton Sea: $3.15 billion.
That’s how much money local officials now say they want from California, as detailed in a plan approved Tuesday by the Imperial Irrigation District’s board of directors. It’s less expensive than a $9 billion plan that died in the state Legislature, and local officials hope it will pressure state officials to live up to their promise to restore the lake.
The $3.15 billion would fund shovel-ready pilot projects and new geothermal energy development around the Salton Sea, California’s largest lake. The money would come from several sources, including fees from companies that emit planet-warming greenhouse gases and the $7.5 billion water bond that voters approved in November.
“It’s a bargain compared to $9 billion, which everyone agrees has only served to impede any real discussion about what to do,” Kevin Kelley, the Imperial Irrigation District’s general manager, said at a board meeting Tuesday.
The Salton Sea was once a prime destination for fishing, boating and tourism. But as the agricultural runoff that feeds the lake has declined in recent years, the water has receded, kicking up dust that blows into the Coachella and Imperial valleys. The lake has also become increasingly salty, leading to tilapia die-offs and threatening endangered desert pupfish.
The lake will shrink even more rapidly starting in 2018, due to a massive water transfer deal that will send more farm runoff to San Diego County and the Coachella Valley. If nothing is done to slow its decline, the lake could become a public health and environmental disaster costing as much as $70 billion according to the Oakland-based Pacific Institute.