Palm Beach Post, February 16, 2024
Beginning Saturday, up to 224,000 gallons per minute of Lake Okeechobee water will vomit into Palm Beach County’s placid Lake Worth Lagoon after El Niño rains have ballooned the lake to untenable levels.
The harmful freshwater releases that dilute the estuary’s brackish ecosystem will also increase to the Caloosahatchee River and new releases will begin east to the St. Lucie Estuary. The Army Corps of Engineers announced the discharges Wednesday after Lake Okeechobee reached 16.3 feet above sea level.
“Clearly, nobody is happy with this,” said Lake Worth Beach Commissioner Reinaldo Diaz at a Palm Beach County Water Resources Task Force meeting Thursday.
Lake Okeechobee historically overflowed its banks, sending a slow drift of water through the Everglades and into Florida Bay. It was a unique orchestra of nature that created the River of Grass.
Now, the lake is girdled by the Herbert Hoover Dike. When it gets too high, water is sent gushing to the Atlantic Ocean through waterways where it can cause fetid toxic algae blooms, disrupt oyster spawning and sluice heavy black muck to choke out seagrasses. Traditionally, the Corps has preferred the lake be kept at 12.5 to 15.5 feet above sea level.
Releasing water during the cooler winter months when days are shorter and there is less blue-green algae on the lake is considered better than blasting estuaries during the summer growing season when algae flourishes in the sunshine and higher temperatures.
“These estuaries have not been hammered like this in three years,” said Steve Davis, chief science officer for the Everglades Foundation. “We are in a situation where releasing now will not exacerbate algae growth, but we still know that the water will cause harm.”
Comments