Kati Thanda: A Managed Lake Synthesis
Kati Thanda (Lake Eyre) Summary Lake Eyre: Northern basin reservoir (dark blue). Kati Thanda — known to most Australians as Lake Eyre — is Australia’s largest lake. The famous empty lake at the heart of the continent, filling rarely enough that each event makes national news. This synthesis proposes the permanent freshwater impoundment of the northern basin’s upper reach: a managed reservoir of approximately 1,500 km² surface area and 100 km³ volume — more freshwater storage than all of Australia’s existing dams and reservoirs combined, in a single basin, at the centre of the continent. At approximately 468 Panama Canal equivalents of excavation, it would rank as the largest civil engineering project in human history. The technology exists. The engineering is solved. The only thing missing is the political will to authorise it. ...