Reservoir facts for kids
A reservoir is a lake that is usually man-made (meaning it was made by people). Reservoirs are used to store water for various uses like drinking or making electricity.
Contents
Types
Dammed valleys
Dams are typically built at a narrow part of a valley downstream of a natural basin. The valley sides act as natural walls. In many reservoir construction projects, people have to be moved and re-housed, historical artifacts moved or rare environments relocated. For example, 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. Also, the village of Capel Celyn was relocated during the construction of Llyn Celyn, and Borgo San Pietro of Petrella Salto was relocated during the construction of Lake Salto.
When a reservoir in a valley is consructed, the river has 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, the new top water level exceeds the watershed height. In such cases additional side dams are built to contain the reservoir.
Where it's impossible to build 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 a chain up the valley.
Coastal
Coastal reservoirs are fresh water storage reservoirs located on the sea coast near the river mouth to store the flood water of a river. As the land based reservoir construction is fraught with substantial land submergence, coastal reservoir is preferred economically and technically since it does 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, etc are few existing coastal reservoirs.
Bank-side
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must have an impermeable lining or core: initially these were often made of puddled clay, but this has generally been superseded by the modern use of rolled clay.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 almost eliminate any turbidity. The use of bank-side reservoirs also allows water abstraction to be stopped for some time, when the river is unacceptably polluted or when flow conditions are very low due to drought. The London water supply system is one example of the use of bank-side storage: the water is taken from the River Thames and River Lee; several large Thames-side reservoirs such as Queen Mary Reservoir can be seen along the approach to London Heathrow Airport.
Service
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 the landscape is relatively flat. Other service reservoirs can be almost entirely underground, especially in more hilly or mountainous country. In the United Kingdom, Thames Water has many underground reservoirs, sometimes also called cisterns, built in 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 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.
History
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 water resource management techniques, including 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).
In Sri Lanka, large reservoirs were created by ancient Sinhalese kings in order to save the water for irrigation. The famous Sri Lankan king Parākramabāhu I of Sri Lanka said "Do not let 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.
Uses
Direct water supply
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 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 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.
Hydroelectricity
In 2005, about 25% of the world's 33,105 large dams (over 15 metres in height) were used for hydroelectricity. However of 80,000 dams of all sizes in the U.S., only 3% produce electricity. A reservoir generating hydroelectricity includes turbines connected to the retained water body by large-diameter pipes. These generating sets may be at 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: 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.
Controlling watersources
Reservoirs can be used in a number of ways to control how water flows through downstream waterways:
- Downstream water supply – water may be released from an upland reservoir so that it can be abstracted for drinking water lower down the system, sometimes hundred of miles further downstream.
- Irrigation – water in an irrigation reservoir may be released into networks of canals for use in farmlands or secondary water systems. Irrigation may also be supported by reservoirs which maintain river flows, allowing water to be abstracted for irrigation lower down the river.
- Flood control – also known as an "attenuation" or "balancing" reservoirs, flood control reservoirs collect water at times of very high rainfall, then release it slowly during the following weeks or months. Some of these reservoirs are constructed across the river line, with the onward flow controlled by an orifice plate. When river flow exceeds the capacity of the orifice plate, water builds up behind the dam; but as soon as the flow rate reduces, the water behind the dam is slowly released until the reservoir is empty again. In some cases, such reservoirs only function a few times in a decade, and the land behind the reservoir may be developed as community or recreational land. A new generation of balancing dams are being developed to combat the possible consequences of climate change. They are called "Flood Detention Reservoirs". Because these reservoirs will remain dry for long periods, there may be a risk of the clay core drying out, reducing its structural stability. Recent developments include the use of composite core fill made from recycled materials as an alternative to clay.
- Canals – Where a natural watercourse's water is not available to be diverted into a canal, a reservoir may be built to guarantee the water level in the canal: for example, where a canal climbs through locks to cross a range of hills.
- Recreation – water may be released from a reservoir to create or supplement white water conditions for kayaking and other white-water sports. On salmonid rivers special releases (in Britain called freshets) are made to encourage natural migration behaviours in fish and to provide a variety of fishing conditions for anglers.
Flow balancing
Reservoirs can be used to balance 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 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 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.
Recreation
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 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.
Operation
Water falling as rain upstream of the reservoir, together with any groundwater emerging as springs, 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 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 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.
Examples
Images for kids
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Kardzali Reservoir in Bulgaria is a reservoir in the Rhodope Mountains.
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Lake Osceola on campus of the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida, May 2006
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Cherokee Reservoir in Tennessee. It was formed after the impounding of the Holston River Valley by the Tennessee Valley Authority in 1941 as a part of the New Deal's efforts to bring electricity to the Tennessee Valley.
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The Queen Mother Reservoir in Berkshire, England is an example of a bank-side reservoir; its water is pumped from the River Thames.
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Water level marker in a reservoir
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Brushes Clough Reservoir, located above Shaw and Crompton, England.
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A Great cormorant (Phalacrocorax carbo) perched on a buoy at Farmoor Reservoir, Oxfordshire. As reservoirs may contain stocks of fish, numerous water-bird species may rely on reservoirs and form habitats near them.
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Liptovská Mara in Slovakia (built in 1975) – an example of an artificial lake which significantly changed the local microclimate.
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Lake Volta from space (April 1993).
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Lake Kariba from space.
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See also
In Spanish: Embalse para niños
