Flood Control

Eastern NC saw major flood events in October 2016 and April 2017.  The most recent storm was centered a little west of the catastrophic rain from Hurricane Matthew.  Flooding from both of these events, however, were able to be mitigated somewhat by the presence of Falls and Jordan Lake reservoirs in the Triangle.

Both Falls and Jordan reservoirs are manmade with construction beginning in the 1970’s. In the Triangle area, these lakes receive much attention for their ole of providing drinking water to the growing region.

The largest portion of these lakes storage, however, is dedicated to flood control.  This function was in the news recently as the Army Corp had to release higher volumes of water from Falls Lake to maintain the lake’s ability to provide flood storage. While these releases do have minor flooding impacts on those near the dam, they are not as severe or extreme as flooding that would have occurred had the dams not been built.  Plus, by freeing up more flood storage, they help to mitigate the chance of extreme flooding downstream.

Lake Allocations	Falls		Jordan
	Ac-Ft	% of Total Storage	Ac-ft	% Total Storage
Flood Control	221,182	62.7%	538,400	71.5%
Water Supply	45,000	12.8%	45,800	6.1%
Low Flow Augmentation	61,322	17.4%	94,600	12.6%
Sediment	25,073	7.1%	74,700	9.9%
Total Storage	352,577	100.0%	753,500	100.0%
Source: Falls -http://epec.saw.usace.army.mil/fallpert.txt Jordan- https://deq.nc.gov/about/divisions/water-resources/planning/basin-planning/map-page/cape-fear-river-basin-landing/jordan-lake-water-supply-allocation/jordan-lake-water-supply-allocation-background-info