Official 54 integrated writing

Official 54 integrated writing

Methods of lowering the Salton Sea’s salinity have been suggested in the passage, but they are then refuted by the speaker of the lecture, as shown below.

Firstly, according to the speaker, while it is true that directly desalinating the lake’s water in special facilities would lower its salinity, it is also true that while the water evaporates, the solids left behind would pose a serious health risk to people, as they contain not only salt but also toxic chemicals like selenium. These harmful elements could create a toxic environment where they enter respiratory systems through air and cause sickness.

Secondly, although conducting ocean water into the lake would decrease the lake’s salinity, the construction of the pipeline would require a lot of government resources, as the nearest shoreline of the Pacific Ocean is 100 kilometers away. Doing so would be overly expensive and therefore not stand as a feasible option.

Thirdly, water salinity can fluctuate drastically when earthquakes and other geological activities take place. While the passage mentions that dividing the lake into sections and seperately controlling their salinity could work to reverse salinity, geological activities in California occur frequently and the walls dividing the lake could easily be destroyed when an earthquake hits the region and salinity in the smaller sections rises, mixing the high-salinity waters and low-salinity waters together. Therefore, the third option would be impractical.