| What
is a reservoir?
A reservoir
is a lake-like area where water is kept until it is needed. They
come in all shapes and sizes. The picture to the right shows four
reservoirs we visited. One water company even used a canal as a
reservoir. Reservoirs are owned by a water company or
authority.
How are
reservoirs made?
Reservoirs are either man-made or natural. Natural ones are part of
the land and are not made by people. Lakes and ponds are natural
reservoirs. We visited a natural one that was donated by a family so
that the town would have another water source.
Building a man-made reservoir is a big job. It
takes from 5-8 years to plan, three years to build, and costs lots of
money, too. We visited the New Jersey Water Authority and talked to
them about reservoirs. This water facility manages 25% of New Jersey
water. We learned a lot about the building of two very large
reservoirs.
In the 1950s, New Jersey had a drought. Water
companies were asking questions like:
- How do we get water to meet the needs of
the people?
- How are we going to meet these needs in
the future as more and more development takes place?
The state estimated how much water was
needed for the next 80 years and then built two large reservoirs.
Unhappily, the estimates were wrong because no one guessed how many people
would move here and how much development would happen. The state
needed to plan for the future earlier than they thought they would.
We were told that the goal is to make sure that when people turn on water
it is always there. This is known as a 'never-ending' supply.
Planning is important in making a reservoir. Once
the engineers find a good water source, they decide how large the
reservoir needs to be. They begin to buy any property that
will be under water when the reservoir is done.
A large structure is built to send the water out of the
reservoirs. It goes to the towns and water companies that buy
it. The amount of water going out of the reservoir is controlled
here. Inside this building is a crane-like machine that lifts panels
and drops them into a slot to cover the openings. This lets less
water out of the reservoir.
When there is a whole lot of rain or melting snow, a
reservoir can get too high. Spillways are made so that water can
overflow into nearby rivers and streams to keep the reservoir at the level
they want it.
Spillways are made so that if the reservoir gets too
high, the water can spill over into rivers and wetland areas. We
were surprised to see these spillways have so much animal life in
them. It was easy to see that wetlands and watersheds are important
to our water supply AND our environment.
The Water Authority also has a old canal system that
they use for water distribution.
In the past, it was used to move goods from place to place. This
facility rebuilt it and they use it like it is a reservoir. There
are locks that raise and lower water levels
and aqueducts that move it from place to
place. Towns along the canal can tap
into it to get water when they need it.
Continue
to Reservoir 2 page
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