Minnesota lake · state assessment record
Bright
Assessment decisions reported by Minnesota to EPA under Clean Water Act sections 303(d) and 305(b), last assessed in the 2016 reporting cycle. The cleanup plan below was established by EPA rather than by Minnesota.
- 638
- Assessed acres
- Lake, Freshwater
- Water type
This waterbody in one line
Bright, a lake in Minnesota, is assessed as not supporting one or more designated uses, with 2 listed impairment causes in the state's most recent Integrated Report cycle (2016). By assessed acreage it sits among the largest 10% by assessed acreage nationally (38,628 lakes); its impairment list is among the longest nationally (2 listed causes vs 23,610 assessed lakes). Aquatic life is assessed as not supporting.
- Not Supporting
- overall status
- P92
- Assessed size nationally
- P10
- 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.
Bright against the ATTAINS register
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 Bright nationally is assessed size: 638.5 acres, larger than 92% of the 38,628 lake-type units with an area on file.
Every filed use falls short
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.
Bright: Category 5, TMDL still owed
Category 5 is the Integrated Report band where a TMDL (or equivalent) is still expected for Bright. Read the listed causes and any cleanup actions filed beside them before treating the overall status tile as a finished restoration story.
Longer than most cause lists
2 listed causes puts this unit above 80% of assessed lake-type records by list length. Treat that as a coding-and-sampling signal: states that split pollutants finely mint longer lists without proving worse water.
Overall status: not supporting
The filer's overall status for Bright is Not Supporting. That tile summarizes the assessment unit; the designated-use rows and cause list are the evidence behind it.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's ATTAINS program, Minnesota carries 13,176 filed lake-type waterbodies in the August 2026 extract, and this page renders the assessment record EPA assigned to Bright 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Aquatic Life | Aquatic-life or related | Not Supporting |
| Aquatic Recreation | Recreation | Not Supporting |
| Aquatic Consumption | Fish-consumption or fishery | Not Assessed |
The record
Listed impairment causes
Causes the state listed as impairing designated uses of this lake, with the cycle each was first listed and the Clean Water Act action recorded against it.
| Cause | Affected uses | First listed | Cleanup standing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fish Bioassessments | Aquatic Life | 2018 | TMDL priority: Medium |
| Nutrients | Aquatic Recreation | 2018 | TMDL established by EPA |
Reading the record
EPA plan standing on Bright
1 cleanup plan EPA established here
EPA, not Minnesota, established that plan.
Scale and rank
Bright is one of 13,176 lake-type waterbodies reported to EPA from Minnesota, and one of 1,939 whose reported record carries enough populated assessment or gauge data for this site to list and index it. At 638 assessed acres it ranks 3,147th 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 3,146 lakes with a larger one.
Open in the register
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 Bright 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
638 Top 8% larger than 92% 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
2 Longer than most more listed causes than 80% 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 Bright. Hover or tap any bar for its full count and share.
In context
Minnesota context
ATTAINS carries 13,176 lake-type waterbodies in Minnesota, 1,798 assessed as not supporting at least one use and 1,566 fully supporting. Among the 1,939 indexed units there, Bright ranks 165th by listed-cause count (2 listed causes) and 424th by assessed size among the 1,930 with an area filed; it sits in the not-supporting set (1,798 statewide) . Its listed causes include Fish Bioassessments and Nutrients, which also appear among Minnesota's most-filed impairment causes (led by Mercury in Fish Tissue).
| Other large assessed lakes in Minnesota | Assessed acres |
|---|---|
| Superior Not Supporting | 13,182,720 |
| Lake of the Woods Not Supporting | 301,348 |
| Red (Lower Red) Not reported | 164,699 |
| Lower Red Lake Fully Supporting | 164,689 |
| Mille Lacs Not Supporting | 128,076 |
| Red (Upper Red) Not Supporting | 119,279 |
Peers near Bright's size or cause load
Similar assessed acres
Nearest filed extents (638 acres here).
- Tuscawilla Lake · 638 acres · FL
- Eagle Lake · 639 acres · FL
- East Long Lake (Valentine NWR) · 638 acres · NE
- Lake Burnt Mills · 638 acres · VA
Similar cause load
Nearest listed-cause counts (2 here). Peers already in the acreage column are omitted.
- 12th St. Beach · 2 causes · IL
- 31st St. Beach · 2 causes · IL
- 49th St. Beach · 2 causes · IL
- 57th St. Beach · 2 causes · IL
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 MN46-0052-00. 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.