Water Management Situation Report for Cumberland River Basin Reservoir System and Associated Waterways

Other Projects

Laurel River Lake became a system player due to the dropping water level in Lake Cumberland. As water levels dropped below the 680 elevation in Lake Cumberland and with little relief in sight from the hot, dry conditions of the drought, the Nashville District Corps turned to Laurel River Lake as a source of water. Though deep, the overall storage capacity in Laurel is fairly small. No controllable spillway exists at Laurel. All discharges come from the single hydropower unit. Laurel did represent the only available water in storage that could be used, once discharged from the hydropower plant, to at least slow the fall of the Lake Cumberland pool. Through an agreement with the Eastern Kentucky Power Cooperative which markets the power produced by Laurel, it was possible to obtain additional water from Laurel during the most critical phase of the ongoing drought. The use of water from Laurel highlights the adaptive management employed by the Corps of Engineers during this first year of major repairs at vital dams downstream.

Much of the water quality monitoring carried out by the Corps is performed using this specialized vessel. Nashville District Water Management crews traveled several thousand miles on the water performing monitoring tasks during 2007.

Also evident this year has been the cooperative nature of agencies and other entities in achieving the overall goal of meeting basic river system purposes while conserving the water resource in light of the uncertainty of when the drought would end. Even though there has recently been a return to more characteristic rainfall patterns, the effects of the 2007 drought are not entirely behind us.