West Virginia reservoir · state assessment record
Beech Fork Lake (b)
Assessment decisions reported by West Virginia to EPA under Clean Water Act sections 303(d) and 305(b), last assessed in the 2024 reporting cycle.
- 224
- Assessed acres
- Lake / Reservoir / Pond
- Water type
This waterbody in one line
Beech Fork Lake (b), a reservoir in West Virginia, is assessed as not supporting one or more designated uses, with one listed impairment cause in the state's most recent Integrated Report cycle (2024). By assessed acreage it sits in the upper quartile by assessed acreage nationally (38,628 lakes); its impairment list is among the longest nationally (one listed cause vs 23,610 assessed lakes). Aquatic life is assessed as not supporting.
- Not Supporting
- overall status
- P83
- Assessed size nationally
- P20
- Shorter cause list
- Not Supporting
- aquatic life
Assessment verdicts are the state agency's decisions as reported to EPA ATTAINS; PlainLakes renders them without modification.
A composite of this record's EPA ATTAINS designated-use verdicts, filed impairment count, and assessment currency, weighted and benchmarked against the national corpus of assessed active waterbodies. This is a water-quality standing, not a human-recreation or property-value judgment, and dimensions with no filed verdict drop out rather than count against the score.
Reading Beech Fork Lake (b)'s filed record
Paragraphs are selected by this unit's percentiles and use matrix: different lakes lead with different dimensions. Figures are ATTAINS / portal register arithmetic, not advice.
The signature stat: assessed size
The number that most separates Beech Fork Lake (b) nationally is assessed size: 223.7 acres, larger than 83% of the 38,628 lake-type units with an area on file.
Every ruled-on use is not supporting
On the uses this filer ruled on, recreation, aquatic life, every determination is Not Supporting. That is a use-by-use reading of the filed record, not a single overall lake grade.
Beech Fork Lake (b): Category 5, TMDL still owed
Category 5 is the Integrated Report band where a TMDL (or equivalent) is still expected for Beech Fork Lake (b). Read the listed causes and any cleanup actions filed beside them before treating the overall status tile as a finished restoration story.
Overall status: not supporting
The filer's overall status for Beech Fork Lake (b) is Not Supporting. That tile summarizes the assessment unit; the designated-use rows and cause list are the evidence behind it.
Typical cause-list length
1 listed cause is a middle-tercile list length among assessed lake-type units. Look to IR category and use outcomes for the distinctive reading.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's ATTAINS program, West Virginia carries 434 filed lake-type waterbodies in the August 2026 extract, and this page renders the assessment record EPA assigned to Beech Fork Lake (b) without modification. See our methodology for reporting-unit limits and gauge linking rules.
The record
Designated-use assessments
Fully Supporting and Not Supporting are the state's definitive verdicts; other entries mean the use was not conclusively assessed in this cycle.
| Designated use | Group | Verdict |
|---|---|---|
| Warm Water Fishery | Aquatic-life or related | Not Supporting |
| Water Contact Recreation: Recreation | Recreation | Not Supporting |
| Agriculture and Wildlife | Other | Insufficient Information |
| Public Water Supply | Drinking-water supply designation | Insufficient Information |
| Water Contact Recreation: Fish Consumption | Fish-consumption or fishery | Not Assessed |
| Water Supply Industrial, Water Transport, Cooling and Power | Other | Insufficient Information |
The record
Listed impairment causes
Causes the state listed as impairing designated uses of this reservoir, with the cycle each was first listed and the Clean Water Act action recorded against it.
| Cause | Affected uses | First listed | Cleanup standing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Phosphorus | Warm Water Fishery, Water Contact Recreation: Recreation | 2016 | TMDL priority: High |
Reading the record
Cleanup queue for Beech Fork Lake (b)
1 listed cause ranked High in the TMDL queue, still without a plan
West Virginia ranked Phosphorus high in its TMDL development queue, and no cleanup plan is on file for that listing yet. That queue rank is the state's own scheduling signal, not an EPA national rule.
A High ranking names a position in the state's plan-writing queue; it is not a measure of how impaired the water is. How listing and cleanup work.
Scale and rank
Beech Fork Lake (b) is one of 434 lake-type waterbodies reported to EPA from West Virginia, and one of 44 whose reported record carries enough populated assessment or gauge data for this site to list and index it. At 224 assessed acres it ranks 6,613th by assessed size among the 38,628 lakes the dataset carries an area for, counting a state’s repeated filings of one water once, behind 6,612 lakes with a larger one.
Awaiting a filing
The state has not yet filed a definitive fish-consumption verdict for this record; that field populates when it reports it in a future Integrated Report cycle.
In context
Where Beech Fork Lake (b) sits nationally
Assessed size among U.S. lakes
Distribution of assessed acreage across ATTAINS lakes filed with an area, counting a state’s repeated filings of one water once
224 Top 17% larger than 83% of 38,628 lakes
lakes the dataset carries an area for, counting a state’s repeated filings of one water once, bucketed by value
Source EPA ATTAINS · Reporting cycles 1987–2026
Listed causes vs waterbodies carrying a verdict
How many impairment causes U.S. waterbodies with a reported verdict carry
1 Longer than most more listed causes than 49% of 23,610 waterbodies carrying a verdict
named waterbodies carrying a verdict, bucketed by value
Source EPA ATTAINS · Reporting cycles 1987–2026
In both charts each bar is a band and taller bars hold more waterbodies; the dashed line and filled bar mark Beech Fork Lake (b). Hover or tap any bar for its full count and share.
In context
West Virginia context
ATTAINS carries 434 lake-type waterbodies in West Virginia, 44 assessed as not supporting at least one use and 31 fully supporting. Among the 44 indexed units there, Beech Fork Lake (b) ranks 25th by listed-cause count (one listed cause) and 15th by assessed size among the 44 with an area filed; it sits in the not-supporting set (44 statewide) . Its listed causes include Phosphorus, which also appears among West Virginia's most-filed impairment causes (led by Methylmercury in Fish Tissue).
| Other large assessed lakes in West Virginia | Assessed acres |
|---|---|
| Tygart Lake Not Assessed | 1,852 |
| Cheat Lake Not Supporting | 1,440 |
| Summersville Lake (d) Not Supporting | 1,305 |
| Stonewall Jackson Lake (c) Not Supporting | 1,168 |
| Mount Storm Lake Fully Supporting | 1,167 |
| Sutton Lake (c) Not Supporting | 944 |
Peers near Beech Fork Lake (b)'s size or cause load
Similar assessed acres
Nearest filed extents (224 acres here).
- Jamesville Reservoir · 224 acres · NY
- Arrowhead Lake-02040106001159 · 224 acres · PA
- Alkali Lake · 224 acres · ND
- Bader Lake · 224 acres · ND
Similar cause load
Nearest listed-cause counts (1 here). Peers already in the acreage column are omitted.
- Aaron · 1 causes · MN
- Aaron River Reservoir · 1 causes · MA
- Abbotts Creek (including Lexington-Thomasville Water Supply Reservoir at normal reservoir elevation, Tom-A-Lex Lake) · 1 causes · NC
- Abeniki Lake · 1 causes · NH
What to do with this record
- Assessment verdicts are cycle-based, not real-time. For fish-consumption decisions, your state advisory program is the binding source. Consumption status guide
- Impairment listings follow the Clean Water Act 303(d) process; a listing is a regulatory finding, not a closure notice. 303(d) explained
PlainLakes renders state assessment decisions and federal gauge observations without modification. It does not issue advisories.
Assessment decisions on this page are rendered directly from state Integrated Report records in EPA's ATTAINS system; gauge figures are daily-value observations from the USGS National Water Information System, no number is typed in by an editor. Overall status, use verdicts, and causes are the state's reported decisions for assessment unit WV-OT-L5-270_b. Counts and percentiles are computed across all lake-type records PlainLakes ingests from ATTAINS. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of 2026-08-17. Primary sources: EPA ATTAINS and USGS National Water Information System.