With some planning and foresight, there are ways you can maximize your investment in a brine pond—including the pond itself, and the land on which it is situated. Maximizing the value of the pond means considering ways to increase it’s useful life. This means being thorough while excavating to ensure that the pond’s base is as solid as it can be, not prone to shifting or settling with time, which are factors that can eventually damage the lining. You’ll also want to choose a durable liner designed to stand up to concentrated brine and UV rays without degrading. Though the liner can be expensive at the outset, it can save you a lot of money in the long term by extending the pond’s use life and reducing the expenses associated with maintenance, repairing leaks, and environmental remediation.
Where the land is concerned, you can maximize your investment by choosing land that will have a use after the pond has been removed. Consider the fact that after the pond is gone, the soil may have high salinity. One way that people recycle land after brine ponds have been removed is to use that land for grazing. Coastal grasses that are acclimated to seaside environments can often thrive where soil salinity is high. Livestock like cows, sheep and goats can graze on these grasses—and provide manure that will enrich the land for later agricultural uses as crop producing land.
