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Show (.jteKeiitf Rupert . . . Itake Brine Problems Intensify Issues Confronting Legislature b'v C. Sh.irp ,.a' I'.isl.itni'o when it J.i'-'-irV vv'11 fu': '',Z,'-n-v.i to deal with I - - salt migration fivm (he south arm ot Croat Salt, Lake to the north arm. This was disclosed Aue.usr 11 a: a mooting ot Great Salt Lake Minerals find Chemical Corp official-! with lv. Calvin L. Rampton. UaroUl J. Atulivws, vice, chairman of the company's board, told Rampton that it a 1,500 foot passage throufji tho Southern Pacific railroad rail-road causeway is built as proposed, that this couTd ruin his company. Operations of our $10 million mil-lion installation were plan-nod plan-nod to take advantage of the greater concentration of hrine in tlie north arm,0 ho said. Out of Operation "If the proposed 1,500 foot passage through the causeway cause-way does equalize salt content con-tent between the two arms of the lake this could put us out of operation," he said. ''Wo simply can't afford the capital it would take to enlarge and alter our opera, tions to handle brines of greatly reduced concentration," concentra-tion," ho added. Great Salt Lake Minerals, ho said, takes brines from the north arm of the lake and carries these by canal to ils evaporation ponds near Lit. tie Mountain, site of process- ing operations. Andrews said National Lead Co., which has an $80 million plant for extraction of magnesium from lake brines at the southwest corner cor-ner of the lake, and salt companies, com-panies, could similarly divert di-vert brines from the north arm. It would cost from $1.5 to ?2 million to build a canal to do this, he said. $85.29 Million Cost A report released at the July 6 meeting on lake prob lems estimated that it would cost $85.29 million initially to pump brine from the nor:h arm to National Lea'd and south shore salt companies. com-panies. Annual pumping costs for such an installation would be about $427,000, the report says. Authors were Dr. J. A. Wholan, research geologist;, geolo-gist;, Utah Geological and Mineralogical Survey, and Norman Stauffer. State Water Wa-ter Resources Division engineer. en-gineer. Another problem facing the 1973 Legislature is what to do about strengthening (or abandoning) the causeway cause-way west from Syracuse to Great Salt Lake State Park at the north tip of Antelope Island. Funds for a parkway along Jordan River through Salt Lake County also will be sought from the Legislature. Lake Drilling Hearing The State Land Board will conduct a public hearing August 30 in the State Office Building auditorium on proposals pro-posals to lease virtually all the lakebed for exploring and drilling for oil and gas. Rampton announced Aug. 10 that provided the present economic trend continues the state will have a surplus of $7 to $10 million by next July 1. Sales tax collections for the April, May and June quarter are up 14 per cent ahead of last yea, he said. He reported an increase of 21,90fj in non-govenment non-agicult'ual non-agicult'ual jobs, or a net increase in-crease of 18,900 jobs statewide state-wide this July compared with a year ago. Cable T - V The State Supreme Court held 3 - 2 on August 9 that community television concerns con-cerns are not public utilities. utili-ties. They thus apparently may contract for stringing cables on utility poles without with-out permission of property owners. The State Public Service Commission still was resisting re-sisting promiscuous stringing string-ing of cables and had ordered order-ed both the telephone and power companies to refrain from allowing such cables on their poles. |