96-510: Heiliger See (English: Holy Lake) is a lake within the city limits of Potsdam , Brandenburg , Germany , located northeast of the city center and bordering the historic park known as the New Garden . Together with the lakes Sacrower See and Groß Glienicker See to the north it forms a chain of lakes resulting from a glacial tunnel valley . The lake is 1.33 km long and 300 metres wide on average. Because of its picturesque location amidst
192-537: A block for migrating fish, trapping them in one area, producing food and a habitat for various water-birds. They can also flood various ecosystems on land and may cause extinctions. Creating reservoirs can alter the natural biogeochemical cycle of mercury . After a reservoir's initial formation, there is a large increase in the production of toxic methylmercury (MeHg) via microbial methylation in flooded soils and peat. MeHg levels have also been found to increase in zooplankton and in fish. Dams can severely reduce
288-409: A body of water from 2 hectares (5 acres) to 8 hectares (20 acres). Pioneering animal ecologist Charles Elton regarded lakes as waterbodies of 40 hectares (99 acres) or more. The term lake is also used to describe a feature such as Lake Eyre , which is a dry basin most of the time but may become filled under seasonal conditions of heavy rainfall. In common usage, many lakes bear names ending with
384-791: A chain up the valley. Coastal reservoirs are fresh water storage reservoirs located on the sea coast near a river mouth to store the flood water of a river. As the land-based reservoir construction is fraught with substantial land submergence, coastal reservoirs are preferred economically and technically since they do not use scarce land area. Many coastal reservoirs were constructed in Asia and Europe. Saemanguem in South Korea, Marina Barrage in Singapore, Qingcaosha in China, and Plover Cove in Hong Kong are
480-496: A comprehensive analysis of the origin of lakes and proposed what is a widely accepted classification of lakes according to their origin. This classification recognizes 11 major lake types that are divided into 76 subtypes. The 11 major lake types are: Tectonic lakes are lakes formed by the deformation and resulting lateral and vertical movements of the Earth's crust. These movements include faulting, tilting, folding, and warping. Some of
576-636: A conventional oil-fired thermal generation plant. For instance, In 1990, the impoundment behind the Balbina Dam in Brazil (inaugurated in 1987) had over 20 times the impact on global warming than would generating the same power from fossil fuels, due to the large area flooded per unit of electricity generated. Another study published in the Global Biogeochemical Cycles also found that newly flooded reservoirs released more carbon dioxide and methane than
672-529: A drop of water seep into the ocean without benefiting mankind." He created the reservoir named Parakrama Samudra ("sea of King Parakrama"). Vast artificial reservoirs were also built by various ancient kingdoms in Bengal, Assam, and Cambodia. Many dammed river reservoirs and most bank-side reservoirs are used to provide the raw water feed to a water treatment plant which delivers drinking water through water mains. The reservoir does not merely hold water until it
768-525: A few such coastal reservoirs. Where water is pumped or siphoned from a river of variable quality or size, bank-side reservoirs may be built to store the water. Such reservoirs are usually formed partly by excavation and partly by building a complete encircling bund or embankment , which may exceed 6 km (4 miles) in circumference. Both the floor of the reservoir and the bund must have an impermeable lining or core: initially these were often made of puddled clay , but this has generally been superseded by
864-402: A form of organic lake. They form where a buildup of partly decomposed plant material in a wet environment leaves the vegetated surface below the water table for a sustained period of time. They are often low in nutrients and mildly acidic, with bottom waters low in dissolved oxygen. Artificial lakes or anthropogenic lakes are large waterbodies created by human activity . They can be formed by
960-455: A high-level reservoir is filled with water using high-performance electric pumps at times when electricity demand is low, and then uses this stored water to generate electricity by releasing the stored water into a low-level reservoir when electricity demand is high. Such systems are called pump-storage schemes. Reservoirs can be used in a number of ways to control how water flows through downstream waterways: Reservoirs can be used to balance
1056-538: A higher perimeter to area ratio than other lake types. These form where sediment from a tributary blocks the main river. These form where sediment from the main river blocks a tributary, usually in the form of a levee . Lakes formed by other processes responsible for floodplain basin creation. During high floods they are flushed with river water. There are four types: 1. Confluent floodplain lake, 2. Contrafluent-confluent floodplain lake, 3. Contrafluent floodplain lake, 4. Profundal floodplain lake. A solution lake
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#17330932191361152-510: A hypolimnion; accordingly, very shallow lakes are excluded from this classification system. Based upon their thermal stratification, lakes are classified as either holomictic , with a uniform temperature and density from top to bottom at a given time of year, or meromictic , with layers of water of different temperature and density that do not intermix. The deepest layer of water in a meromictic lake does not contain any dissolved oxygen so there are no living aerobic organisms . Consequently,
1248-428: A lake consists of a large area of standing water that occupies an extensive closed depression in limestone, it is also called a karst lake . Smaller solution lakes that consist of a body of standing water in a closed depression within a karst region are known as karst ponds. Limestone caves often contain pools of standing water, which are known as underground lakes . Classic examples of solution lakes are abundant in
1344-470: A large number of studies agree that small ponds are much more abundant than large lakes. For example, one widely cited study estimated that Earth has 304 million lakes and ponds, and that 91% of these are 1 hectare (2.5 acres) or less in area. Despite the overwhelming abundance of ponds, almost all of Earth's lake water is found in fewer than 100 large lakes; this is because lake volume scales superlinearly with lake area. Extraterrestrial lakes exist on
1440-570: A loss in both quantity and quality of water necessary for maintaining ecological balance and pose a risk of increasing severity and duration of droughts due to climate change. In summary, they consider it a misadaptation to climate change. Proponents of reservoirs or substitution reserves, on the other hand, see them as a solution for sustainable agriculture while waiting for a truly durable agricultural model. Without such reserves, they fear that unsustainable imported irrigation will be inevitable. They believe that these reservoirs should be accompanied by
1536-419: A narrow valley or canyon may cover relatively little vegetation, while one situated on a plain may flood a great deal of vegetation. The site may be cleared of vegetation first or simply flooded. Tropical flooding can produce far more greenhouse gases than in temperate regions. The following table indicates reservoir emissions in milligrams per square meter per day for different bodies of water. Depending upon
1632-489: A natural outflow and lose water solely by evaporation or underground seepage, or both. These are termed endorheic lakes. Many lakes are artificial and are constructed for hydroelectric power generation, aesthetic purposes, recreational purposes, industrial use, agricultural use, or domestic water supply . The number of lakes on Earth is undetermined because most lakes and ponds are very small and do not appear on maps or satellite imagery . Despite this uncertainty,
1728-592: A reservoir is called the "conservation pool". In the United Kingdom, "top water level" describes the reservoir full state, while "fully drawn down" describes the minimum retained volume. There is a wide variety of software for modelling reservoirs, from the specialist Dam Safety Program Management Tools (DSPMT) to the relatively simple WAFLEX , to integrated models like the Water Evaluation And Planning system (WEAP) that place reservoir operations in
1824-403: A result of meandering. The slow-moving river forms a sinuous shape as the outer side of bends are eroded away more rapidly than the inner side. Eventually a horseshoe bend is formed and the river cuts through the narrow neck. This new passage then forms the main passage for the river and the ends of the bend become silted up, thus forming a bow-shaped lake. Their crescent shape gives oxbow lakes
1920-522: A result of the 1959 Hebgen Lake earthquake . Most landslide lakes disappear in the first few months after formation, but a landslide dam can burst suddenly at a later stage and threaten the population downstream when the lake water drains out. In 1911, an earthquake triggered a landslide that blocked a deep valley in the Pamir Mountains region of Tajikistan , forming the Sarez Lake . The Usoi Dam at
2016-720: A river valley, with the potential to wash away towns and villages and cause considerable loss of life, such as the devastation following the failure of containment at Llyn Eigiau which killed 17 people. (see also List of dam failures ) A notable case of reservoirs being used as an instrument of war involved the British Royal Air Force Dambusters raid on Germany in World War II (codenamed " Operation Chastise " ), in which three German reservoir dams were selected to be breached in order to damage German infrastructure and manufacturing and power capabilities deriving from
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#17330932191362112-574: A territorial project that unites all water stakeholders with the goal of preserving and enhancing natural environments. Two main types of reservoirs can be distinguished based on their mode of supply. Circa 3000 BC, the craters of extinct volcanoes in Arabia were used as reservoirs by farmers for their irrigation water. Dry climate and water scarcity in India led to early development of stepwells and other water resource management techniques, including
2208-422: A variation in density because of thermal gradients. Stratification can also result from a density variation caused by gradients in salinity. In this case, the hypolimnion and epilimnion are separated not by a thermocline but by a halocline , which is sometimes referred to as a chemocline . Lakes are informally classified and named according to the seasonal variation in their lake level and volume. Some of
2304-443: Is sag ponds . Volcanic lakes are lakes that occupy either local depressions, e.g. craters and maars , or larger basins, e.g. calderas , created by volcanism . Crater lakes are formed in volcanic craters and calderas, which fill up with precipitation more rapidly than they empty via either evaporation, groundwater discharge, or a combination of both. Sometimes the latter are called caldera lakes, although often no distinction
2400-403: Is a lake occupying a basin formed by surface dissolution of bedrock. In areas underlain by soluble bedrock, its solution by precipitation and percolating water commonly produce cavities. These cavities frequently collapse to form sinkholes that form part of the local karst topography . Where groundwater lies near the grounds surface, a sinkhole will be filled water as a solution lake. If such
2496-471: Is a natural lake whose level was raised by a low dam and into which the River Dee flows or discharges depending upon flow conditions, as part of the River Dee regulation system . This mode of operation is a form of hydraulic capacitance in the river system. Many reservoirs often allow some recreational uses, such as fishing and boating . Special rules may apply for the safety of the public and to protect
2592-480: Is a water reservoir for agricultural use. They are filled using pumped groundwater , pumped river water or water runoff and are typically used during the local dry season. This type of infrastructure has sparked an opposition movement in France, with numerous disputes and, for some projects, protests, especially in the former Poitou-Charentes region where violent demonstrations took place in 2022 and 2023. In Spain, there
2688-437: Is also used technically to refer to certain forms of liquid storage, such the "coolant reservoir" that captures overflow of coolant in an automobile's cooling system. Dammed reservoirs are artificial lakes created and controlled by a dam constructed across a valley and rely on the natural topography to provide most of the basin of the reservoir. These reservoirs can either be on-stream reservoirs , which are located on
2784-462: Is dammed behind an ice shelf that is attached to the coastline. They are mostly found in Antarctica. Fluvial (or riverine) lakes are lakes produced by running water. These lakes include plunge pool lakes , fluviatile dams and meander lakes. The most common type of fluvial lake is a crescent-shaped lake called an oxbow lake due to the distinctive curved shape. They can form in river valleys as
2880-501: Is greater acceptance because all beneficiary users are involved in the implementation of the system. The specific debate about substitution reservoirs is part of a broader discussion related to reservoirs used for agricultural irrigation, regardless of their type, and a certain model of intensive agriculture. Opponents view these reservoirs as a monopolization of resources benefiting only a few, representing an outdated model of productive agriculture. They argue that these reservoirs lead to
2976-448: Is made. An example is Crater Lake in Oregon , in the caldera of Mount Mazama . The caldera was created in a massive volcanic eruption that led to the subsidence of Mount Mazama around 4860 BCE. Other volcanic lakes are created when either rivers or streams are dammed by lava flows or volcanic lahars . The basin which is now Malheur Lake , Oregon was created when a lava flow dammed
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3072-466: Is needed: it can also be the first part of the water treatment process. The time the water is held before it is released is known as the retention time . This is a design feature that allows particles and silts to settle out, as well as time for natural biological treatment using algae , bacteria and zooplankton that naturally live in the water. However natural limnological processes in temperate climate lakes produce temperature stratification in
3168-528: Is now used by the Aquarius Golf Club. Service reservoirs perform several functions, including ensuring sufficient head of water in the water distribution system and providing water capacity to even-out peak demand from consumers, enabling the treatment plant to run at optimum efficiency. Large service reservoirs can also be managed to reduce the cost of pumping by refilling the reservoir at times of day when energy costs are low. An irrigation reservoir
3264-419: Is stored in the reservoir. Any excess water can be spilled via a specifically designed spillway. Stored water may be piped by gravity for use as drinking water , to generate hydro-electricity or to maintain river flows to support downstream uses. Occasionally reservoirs can be managed to retain water during high rainfall events to prevent or reduce downstream flooding. Some reservoirs support several uses, and
3360-466: Is the portion of the reservoir that can be used for flood control, power production, navigation , and downstream releases. In addition, a reservoir's "flood control capacity" is the amount of water it can regulate during flooding. The "surcharge capacity" is the capacity of the reservoir above the spillway crest that cannot be regulated. In the United States, the water below the normal maximum level of
3456-429: Is unknown but is estimated to be at least 2 million. Finland has 168,000 lakes of 500 square metres (5,400 sq ft) in area, or larger, of which 57,000 are large (10,000 square metres (110,000 sq ft) or larger). Most lakes have at least one natural outflow in the form of a river or stream , which maintain a lake's average level by allowing the drainage of excess water. Some lakes do not have
3552-752: The Malheur River . Among all lake types, volcanic crater lakes most closely approximate a circular shape. Glacial lakes are lakes created by the direct action of glaciers and continental ice sheets. A wide variety of glacial processes create enclosed basins. As a result, there are a wide variety of different types of glacial lakes and it is often difficult to define clear-cut distinctions between different types of glacial lakes and lakes influenced by other activities. The general types of glacial lakes that have been recognized are lakes in direct contact with ice, glacially carved rock basins and depressions, morainic and outwash lakes, and glacial drift basins. Glacial lakes are
3648-540: The Proto-Indo-European root * leǵ- ('to leak, drain'). Cognates include Dutch laak ('lake, pond, ditch'), Middle Low German lāke ('water pooled in a riverbed, puddle') as in: de:Wolfslake , de:Butterlake , German Lache ('pool, puddle'), and Icelandic lækur ('slow flowing stream'). Also related are the English words leak and leach . There is considerable uncertainty about defining
3744-448: The Ruhr and Eder rivers. The economic and social impact was derived from the enormous volumes of previously stored water that swept down the valleys, wreaking destruction. This raid later became the basis for several films. All reservoirs will have a monetary cost/benefit assessment made before construction to see if the project is worth proceeding with. However, such analysis can often omit
3840-399: The density of water varies with temperature, with a maximum at +4 degrees Celsius, thermal stratification is an important physical characteristic of a lake that controls the fauna and flora , sedimentation, chemistry, and other aspects of individual lakes. First, the colder, denser water typically forms a layer near the bottom, which is called the hypolimnion . Second, normally overlying
3936-481: The water cycle , the processes by which water moves around the Earth. Most lakes are freshwater and account for almost all the world's surface freshwater, but some are salt lakes with salinities even higher than that of seawater . Lakes vary significantly in surface area and volume of water. Lakes are typically larger and deeper than ponds , which are also water-filled basins on land, although there are no official definitions or scientific criteria distinguishing
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4032-646: The 1800s, most of which are lined with brick. A good example is the Honor Oak Reservoir in London, constructed between 1901 and 1909. When it was completed it was said to be the largest brick built underground reservoir in the world and it is still one of the largest in Europe. This reservoir now forms part of the southern extension of the Thames Water Ring Main . The top of the reservoir has been grassed over and
4128-535: The Earth by extraterrestrial objects (either meteorites or asteroids ). Examples of meteorite lakes are Lonar Lake in India, Lake El'gygytgyn in northeast Siberia, and the Pingualuit crater lake in Quebec, Canada. As in the cases of El'gygytgyn and Pingualuit, meteorite lakes can contain unique and scientifically valuable sedimentary deposits associated with long records of paleoclimatic changes. In addition to
4224-533: The Hasengraben, a short canal where the water is kept dammed up to maintain a high water level for the lake. This is done to keep the wooden piles on which the Marmorpalais is built from being exposed to the air and drying out. The lake suffers from an overload of biomass , especially from falling leaves which are decomposed by bacteria on the shallow bottom, depleting the lake of oxygen in the process. In summertime
4320-551: The Lusatian Lake District, Germany. In India, Sudarshana Lake is a historical artificial lake located in the semi-arid region of Girnar, Gujarat, originally constructed during the reign of Chandragupta Maurya. See: List of notable artificial lakes in the United States Meteorite lakes, also known as crater lakes (not to be confused with volcanic crater lakes ), are created by catastrophic impacts with
4416-710: The Meroitic town of Butana . The Hafirs catch the water during rainy seasons in order to ensure water is available for several months during dry seasons to supply drinking water, irrigate fields and water cattle. The Great Reservoir near the Lion Temple in Musawwarat es-Sufra is a notable hafir in Kush. In Sri Lanka , large reservoirs were created by ancient Sinhalese kings in order to store water for irrigation. The famous Sri Lankan king Parākramabāhu I of Sri Lanka said "Do not let
4512-485: The US. The capacity, volume, or storage of a reservoir is usually divided into distinguishable areas. Dead or inactive storage refers to water in a reservoir that cannot be drained by gravity through a dam's outlet works , spillway, or power plant intake and can only be pumped out. Dead storage allows sediments to settle, which improves water quality and also creates an area for fish during low levels. Active or live storage
4608-523: The area flooded versus power produced, a reservoir built for hydro- electricity generation can either reduce or increase the net production of greenhouse gases when compared to other sources of power. A study for the National Institute for Research in the Amazon found that hydroelectric reservoirs release a large pulse of carbon dioxide from decay of trees left standing in the reservoirs, especially during
4704-428: The base of the dam or some distance away. In a flat river valley a reservoir needs to be deep enough to create a head of water at the turbines; and if there are periods of drought the reservoir needs to hold enough water to average out the river's flow throughout the year(s). Run-of-the-river hydro in a steep valley with constant flow needs no reservoir. Some reservoirs generating hydroelectricity use pumped recharge:
4800-856: The base of the valley has remained in place for more than 100 years but the terrain below the lake is in danger of a catastrophic flood if the dam were to fail during a future earthquake. Tal-y-llyn Lake in north Wales is a landslide lake dating back to the last glaciation in Wales some 20000 years ago. Aeolian lakes are produced by wind action . These lakes are found mainly in arid environments, although some aeolian lakes are relict landforms indicative of arid paleoclimates . Aeolian lakes consist of lake basins dammed by wind-blown sand; interdunal lakes that lie between well-oriented sand dunes ; and deflation basins formed by wind action under previously arid paleoenvironments. Moses Lake in Washington , United States,
4896-547: The building of a reservoir at Girnar in 3000 BC. Artificial lakes dating to the 5th century BC have been found in ancient Greece. The artificial Bhojsagar lake in present-day Madhya Pradesh state of India, constructed in the 11th century, covered 650 square kilometres (250 sq mi). The Kingdom of Kush invented the Hafir , a type of reservoir, during the Meroitic period . 800 ancient and modern hafirs have been registered in
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#17330932191364992-442: The context of system-wide demands and supplies. In many countries large reservoirs are closely regulated to try to prevent or minimize failures of containment. While much of the effort is directed at the dam and its associated structures as the weakest part of the overall structure, the aim of such controls is to prevent an uncontrolled release of water from the reservoir. Reservoir failures can generate huge increases in flow down
5088-915: The courses of mature rivers, where a river channel has widened over a basin formed by eroded floodplains and wetlands . Some lakes are found in caverns underground . Some parts of the world have many lakes formed by the chaotic drainage patterns left over from the last ice age . All lakes are temporary over long periods of time , as they will slowly fill in with sediments or spill out of the basin containing them. Artificially controlled lakes are known as reservoirs , and are usually constructed for industrial or agricultural use, for hydroelectric power generation, for supplying domestic drinking water , for ecological or recreational purposes, or for other human activities. The word lake comes from Middle English lake ('lake, pond, waterway'), from Old English lacu ('pond, pool, stream'), from Proto-Germanic * lakō ('pond, ditch, slow moving stream'), from
5184-513: The creation of lakes by the disruption of preexisting drainage networks, it also creates within arid regions endorheic basins that contain salt lakes (also called saline lakes). They form where there is no natural outlet, a high evaporation rate and the drainage surface of the water table has a higher-than-normal salt content. Examples of these salt lakes include Great Salt Lake and the Dead Sea . Another type of tectonic lake caused by faulting
5280-548: The dam located at the narrowest practical point to provide strength and the lowest cost of construction. In many reservoir construction projects, people have to be moved and re-housed, historical artifacts moved or rare environments relocated. Examples include the temples of Abu Simbel (which were moved before the construction of the Aswan Dam to create Lake Nasser from the Nile in Egypt ),
5376-466: The depths can be virtually without oxygen, causing dead ecological zones . Lake A lake is an often naturally occurring, relatively large and fixed body of water on or near the Earth's surface. It is localized in a basin or interconnected basins surrounded by dry land . Lakes lie completely on land and are separate from the ocean , although they may be connected with the ocean by rivers . Lakes, as with other bodies of water , are part of
5472-460: The developed world Naturally occurring lakes receive organic sediments which decay in an anaerobic environment releasing methane and carbon dioxide . The methane released is approximately 8 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. As a human-made reservoir fills, existing plants are submerged and during the years it takes for this matter to decay, will give off considerably more greenhouse gases than lakes do. A reservoir in
5568-622: The difference between lakes and ponds , and neither term has an internationally accepted definition across scientific disciplines or political boundaries. For example, limnologists have defined lakes as water bodies that are simply a larger version of a pond, which can have wave action on the shoreline or where wind-induced turbulence plays a major role in mixing the water column. None of these definitions completely excludes ponds and all are difficult to measure. For this reason, simple size-based definitions are increasingly used to separate ponds and lakes. Definitions for lake range in minimum sizes for
5664-507: The downstream river to maintain river quality, support fisheries, to maintain downstream industrial and recreational uses or for a range of other purposes. Such releases are known as compensation water . The units used for measuring reservoir areas and volumes vary from country to country. In most of the world, reservoir areas are expressed in square kilometers; in the United States, acres are commonly used. For volume, either cubic meters or cubic kilometers are widely used, with acre-feet used in
5760-440: The environmental impacts of dams and the reservoirs that they contain. Some impacts, such as the greenhouse gas production associated with concrete manufacture, are relatively easy to estimate. Other impacts on the natural environment and social and cultural effects can be more difficult to assess and to weigh in the balance but identification and quantification of these issues is now commonly required in major construction projects in
5856-523: The exception of criterion 3, the others have been accepted or elaborated upon by other hydrology publications. The majority of lakes on Earth are freshwater , and most lie in the Northern Hemisphere at higher latitudes . Canada , with a deranged drainage system , has an estimated 31,752 lakes larger than 3 square kilometres (1.2 sq mi) in surface area. The total number of lakes in Canada
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#17330932191365952-491: The first decade after flooding. This elevates the global warming impact of the dams to levels much higher than would occur by generating the same power from fossil fuels . According to the World Commission on Dams report (Dams And Development), when the reservoir is relatively large and no prior clearing of forest in the flooded area was undertaken, greenhouse gas emissions from the reservoir could be higher than those of
6048-413: The flow in highly managed systems, taking in water during high flows and releasing it again during low flows. In order for this to work without pumping requires careful control of water levels using spillways . When a major storm approaches, the dam operators calculate the volume of water that the storm will add to the reservoir. If forecast storm water will overfill the reservoir, water is slowly let out of
6144-525: The historic parks and palaces of Potsdam, with the Marmorpalais on its west shore and Cecilienhof near the north shore, the lake is a popular goal for excursions and has an attractive residential area on its eastern shore. On the north shore there are informal places for swimming and sunbathing, as well as a connection to Lake Jungfernsee and thus to the Havel River’s extensive network of waterways via
6240-580: The hydroelectric reservoirs there do emit greenhouse gases, it is on a much smaller scale than thermal power plants of similar capacity. Hydropower typically emits 35 to 70 times less greenhouse gases per TWh of electricity than thermal power plants. A decrease in air pollution occurs when a dam is used in place of thermal power generation, since electricity produced from hydroelectric generation does not give rise to any flue gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion (including sulfur dioxide , nitric oxide and carbon monoxide from coal ). Dams can produce
6336-422: The hypolimnion is a transition zone known as the metalimnion . Finally, overlying the metalimnion is a surface layer of warmer water with a lower density, called the epilimnion . This typical stratification sequence can vary widely, depending on the specific lake or the time of year, or a combination of both. The classification of lakes by thermal stratification presupposes lakes with sufficient depth to form
6432-907: The intentional damming of rivers and streams, rerouting of water to inundate a previously dry basin , or the deliberate filling of abandoned excavation pits by either precipitation runoff , ground water , or a combination of both. Artificial lakes may be used as storage reservoirs that provide drinking water for nearby settlements , to generate hydroelectricity , for flood management , for supplying agriculture or aquaculture , or to provide an aquatic sanctuary for parks and nature reserves . The Upper Silesian region of southern Poland contains an anthropogenic lake district consisting of more than 4,000 water bodies created by human activity. The diverse origins of these lakes include: reservoirs retained by dams, flooded mines, water bodies formed in subsidence basins and hollows, levee ponds, and residual water bodies following river regulation. Same for
6528-466: The karst regions at the Dalmatian coast of Croatia and within large parts of Florida . A landslide lake is created by the blockage of a river valley by either mudflows , rockslides , or screes . Such lakes are most common in mountainous regions. Although landslide lakes may be large and quite deep, they are typically short-lived. An example of a landslide lake is Quake Lake , which formed as
6624-554: The lake level. Reservoir A reservoir ( / ˈ r ɛ z ər v w ɑːr / ; from French réservoir [ʁezɛʁvwaʁ] ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam , usually built to store fresh water , often doubling for hydroelectric power generation . Reservoirs are created by controlling a watercourse that drains an existing body of water, interrupting a watercourse to form an embayment within it, excavating, or building any number of retaining walls or levees to enclose any area to store water. The term
6720-432: The landscape is relatively flat. Other service reservoirs can be storage pools, water tanks or sometimes entirely underground cisterns , especially in more hilly or mountainous country. Modern reserviors will often use geomembrane liners on their base to limit seepage and/or as floating covers to limit evaporation, particularly in arid climates. In the United Kingdom, Thames Water has many underground reservoirs built in
6816-648: The largest lakes on Earth are rift lakes occupying rift valleys, e.g. Central African Rift lakes and Lake Baikal . Other well-known tectonic lakes, Caspian Sea , the Sea of Aral , and other lakes from the Pontocaspian occupy basins that have been separated from the sea by the tectonic uplift of the sea floor above the ocean level. Often, the tectonic action of crustal extension has created an alternating series of parallel grabens and horsts that form elongate basins alternating with mountain ranges. Not only does this promote
6912-528: The layers of sediment at the bottom of a meromictic lake remain relatively undisturbed, which allows for the development of lacustrine deposits . In a holomictic lake, the uniformity of temperature and density allows the lake waters to completely mix. Based upon thermal stratification and frequency of turnover, holomictic lakes are divided into amictic lakes , cold monomictic lakes , dimictic lakes , warm monomictic lakes, polymictic lakes , and oligomictic lakes. Lake stratification does not always result from
7008-560: The level of a lake are controlled by the difference between the input and output compared to the total volume of the lake. Significant input sources are precipitation onto the lake, runoff carried by streams and channels from the lake's catchment area, groundwater channels and aquifers, and artificial sources from outside the catchment area. Output sources are evaporation from the lake, surface and groundwater flows, and any extraction of lake water by humans. As climate conditions and human water requirements vary, these will create fluctuations in
7104-481: The mainland; lakes cut off from larger lakes by a bar; or lakes divided by the meeting of two spits. Organic lakes are lakes created by the actions of plants and animals. On the whole they are relatively rare in occurrence and quite small in size. In addition, they typically have ephemeral features relative to the other types of lakes. The basins in which organic lakes occur are associated with beaver dams, coral lakes, or dams formed by vegetation. Peat lakes are
7200-424: The mode of origin, lakes have been named and classified according to various other important factors such as thermal stratification , oxygen saturation, seasonal variations in lake volume and water level, salinity of the water mass, relative seasonal permanence, degree of outflow, and so on. The names used by the lay public and in the scientific community for different types of lakes are often informally derived from
7296-470: The modern use of rolled clay. The water stored in such reservoirs may stay there for several months, during which time normal biological processes may substantially reduce many contaminants and reduce turbidity . The use of bank-side reservoirs also allows water abstraction to be stopped for some time, for instance when the river is unacceptably polluted or when flow conditions are very low due to drought . The London water supply system exhibits one example of
7392-485: The moon Titan , which orbits the planet Saturn . The shape of lakes on Titan is very similar to those on Earth. Lakes were formerly present on the surface of Mars, but are now dry lake beds . In 1957, G. Evelyn Hutchinson published a monograph titled A Treatise on Limnology , which is regarded as a landmark discussion and classification of all major lake types, their origin, morphometric characteristics, and distribution. Hutchinson presented in his publication
7488-415: The morphology of the lakes' physical characteristics or other factors. Also, different cultures and regions of the world have their own popular nomenclature. One important method of lake classification is on the basis of thermal stratification, which has a major influence on the animal and plant life inhabiting a lake, and the fate and distribution of dissolved and suspended material in the lake. For example,
7584-406: The most numerous lakes in the world. Most lakes in northern Europe and North America have been either influenced or created by the latest, but not last, glaciation, to have covered the region. Glacial lakes include proglacial lakes , subglacial lakes , finger lakes , and epishelf lakes. Epishelf lakes are highly stratified lakes in which a layer of freshwater, derived from ice and snow melt,
7680-791: The names include: Lakes may be informally classified and named according to the general chemistry of their water mass. Using this classification method, the lake types include: A paleolake (also palaeolake ) is a lake that existed in the past when hydrological conditions were different. Quaternary paleolakes can often be identified on the basis of relict lacustrine landforms, such as relict lake plains and coastal landforms that form recognizable relict shorelines called paleoshorelines . Paleolakes can also be recognized by characteristic sedimentary deposits that accumulated in them and any fossils that might be contained in these sediments. The paleoshorelines and sedimentary deposits of paleolakes provide evidence for prehistoric hydrological changes during
7776-593: The new top water level exceeds the watershed height on one or more of the feeder streams such as at Llyn Clywedog in Mid Wales . In such cases additional side dams are required to contain the reservoir. Where the topography is poorly suited to forming a single large reservoir, a number of smaller reservoirs may be constructed in a chain, as in the River Taff valley where the Llwyn-on , Cantref and Beacons Reservoirs form
7872-415: The operating rules may be complex. Most modern reservoirs have a specially designed draw-off tower that can discharge water from the reservoir at different levels, both to access water as the water level falls, and to allow water of a specific quality to be discharged into the downstream river as "compensation water": the operators of many upland or in-river reservoirs have obligations to release water into
7968-562: The organic-rich deposits of pre-Quaternary paleolakes are important either for the thick deposits of oil shale and shale gas contained in them, or as source rocks of petroleum and natural gas . Although of significantly less economic importance, strata deposited along the shore of paleolakes sometimes contain coal seams . Lakes have numerous features in addition to lake type, such as drainage basin (also known as catchment area), inflow and outflow, nutrient content, dissolved oxygen , pollutants , pH , and sedimentation . Changes in
8064-428: The original streambed of the downstream river and are filled by creeks , rivers or rainwater that runs off the surrounding forested catchments, or off-stream reservoirs , which receive diverted water from a nearby stream or aqueduct or pipeline water from other on-stream reservoirs. Dams are typically located at a narrow part of a downstream of a natural basin. The valley sides act as natural walls, with
8160-428: The pre-flooded landscape, noting that forest lands, wetlands, and preexisting water features all released differing amounts of carbon dioxide and methane both pre- and post-flooding. The Tucuruí Dam in Brazil (completed in 1984) had only 0.4 times the impact on global warming than would generating the same power from fossil fuels. A two-year study of carbon dioxide and methane releases in Canada concluded that while
8256-437: The quality of the water and the ecology of the surrounding area. Many reservoirs now support and encourage less formal and less structured recreation such as natural history , bird watching , landscape painting , walking and hiking , and often provide information boards and interpretation material to encourage responsible use. Water falling as rain upstream of the reservoir, together with any groundwater emerging as springs,
8352-464: The relocation of the village of Capel Celyn during the construction of Llyn Celyn , and the relocation of Borgo San Pietro of Petrella Salto during the construction of Lake Salto . Construction of a dammed reservoir will usually require the river to be diverted during part of the build, often through a temporary tunnel or by-pass channel. In hilly regions, reservoirs are often constructed by enlarging existing lakes. Sometimes in such reservoirs,
8448-627: The reservoir prior to, and during, the storm. If done with sufficient lead time, the major storm will not fill the reservoir and areas downstream will not experience damaging flows. Accurate weather forecasts are essential so that dam operators can correctly plan drawdowns prior to a high rainfall event. Dam operators blamed a faulty weather forecast on the 2010–2011 Queensland floods . Examples of highly managed reservoirs are Burrendong Dam in Australia and Bala Lake ( Llyn Tegid ) in North Wales . Bala Lake
8544-404: The thermal stratification, as well as the degree and frequency of mixing, has a strong control over the distribution of oxygen within the lake. Professor F.-A. Forel , also referred to as the "Father of limnology", was the first scientist to classify lakes according to their thermal stratification. His system of classification was later modified and improved upon by Hutchinson and Löffler. As
8640-456: The times that they existed. There are two types of paleolake: Paleolakes are of scientific and economic importance. For example, Quaternary paleolakes in semidesert basins are important for two reasons: they played an extremely significant, if transient, role in shaping the floors and piedmonts of many basins; and their sediments contain enormous quantities of geologic and paleontologic information concerning past environments. In addition,
8736-641: The two. Lakes are also distinct from lagoons , which are generally shallow tidal pools dammed by sandbars or other material at coastal regions of oceans or large lakes. Most lakes are fed by springs , and both fed and drained by creeks and rivers , but some lakes are endorheic without any outflow, while volcanic lakes are filled directly by precipitation runoffs and do not have any inflow streams. Natural lakes are generally found in mountainous areas (i.e. alpine lakes ), dormant volcanic craters , rift zones and areas with ongoing glaciation . Other lakes are found in depressed landforms or along
8832-493: The use of bank-side storage: here water is taken from the River Thames and River Lee into several large Thames-side reservoirs, such as Queen Mary Reservoir that can be seen along the approach to London Heathrow Airport . Service reservoirs store fully treated potable water close to the point of distribution. Many service reservoirs are constructed as water towers , often as elevated structures on concrete pillars where
8928-412: The water, which tends to partition some elements such as manganese and phosphorus into deep, cold anoxic water during the summer months. In the autumn and winter the lake becomes fully mixed again. During drought conditions, it is sometimes necessary to draw down the cold bottom water, and the elevated levels of manganese in particular can cause problems in water treatment plants. In 2005, about 25% of
9024-462: The word pond , and a lesser number of names ending with lake are, in quasi-technical fact, ponds. One textbook illustrates this point with the following: "In Newfoundland, for example, almost every lake is called a pond, whereas in Wisconsin, almost every pond is called a lake." One hydrology book proposes to define the term "lake" as a body of water with the following five characteristics: With
9120-476: The world's 33,105 large dams (over 15 metres in height) were used for hydroelectricity. The U.S. produces 3% of its electricity from 80,000 dams of all sizes. An initiative is underway to retrofit more dams as a good use of existing infrastructure to provide many smaller communities with a reliable source of energy. A reservoir generating hydroelectricity includes turbines connected to the retained water body by large-diameter pipes. These generating sets may be at
9216-611: Was originally a shallow natural lake and an example of a lake basin dammed by wind-blown sand. China's Badain Jaran Desert is a unique landscape of megadunes and elongated interdunal aeolian lakes, particularly concentrated in the southeastern margin of the desert. Shoreline lakes are generally lakes created by blockage of estuaries or by the uneven accretion of beach ridges by longshore and other currents. They include maritime coastal lakes, ordinarily in drowned estuaries; lakes enclosed by two tombolos or spits connecting an island to
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