Alabama reservoir · state assessment record
Coosa River (Lay Lake) (698 acres)
Assessment decisions reported by Alabama Department of Environmental Management to EPA under Clean Water Act sections 303(d) and 305(b), last assessed in the 2010 reporting cycle.
- 698
- Assessed acres
- Reservoir
- Water type
- Eutrophic
- Reported trophic class
This waterbody in one line
Coosa River (Lay Lake), a reservoir in Alabama, is assessed as not supporting one or more designated uses, with 3 listed impairment causes in the state's most recent Integrated Report cycle (2010). By assessed acreage it sits among the largest 10% by assessed acreage nationally (38,628 lakes); its impairment list is among the longest nationally (3 listed causes vs 23,610 assessed lakes). Aquatic life is assessed as not supporting. Alabama assesses fishing as not supported; it reported no verdict on fish consumption itself.
- Not Supporting
- overall status
- P92
- Assessed size nationally
- P5
- 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.
How Coosa River (Lay Lake) reads against the filed 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 Coosa River (Lay Lake) nationally is assessed size: 698 acres, larger than 92% of the 38,628 lake-type units with an area on file.
No ruled-on use clears the bar
On the uses this filer ruled on, fish consumption, 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.
Longer than most cause lists
3 listed causes puts this unit above 90% 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.
Coosa River (Lay Lake): Category 5, TMDL still owed
Category 5 is the Integrated Report band where a TMDL (or equivalent) is still expected for Coosa River (Lay Lake). 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 Coosa River (Lay Lake) 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, Alabama carries 304 filed lake-type waterbodies in the August 2026 extract, and this page renders the assessment record EPA assigned to Coosa River (Lay Lake) 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. Alabama filed its own confidence on the 5 definitive verdicts it rated: Good. That rating is the filer's, in EPA's own field, and EPA publishes no definition of the four words it offers.
| Designated use | Group | Verdict |
|---|---|---|
| Contact Recreation | Recreation | Not Supporting Filer confidence: Good |
| Drinking and Food Processing | Drinking-water supply designation | Not Supporting Filer confidence: Good |
| Fishing | Fish-consumption or fishery | Not Supporting Filer confidence: Good |
| Industrial and Agriculture Uses | Other | Fully Supporting Filer confidence: Good |
| Propagation of Fish and Wildlife | Aquatic-life or related | Not Supporting Filer confidence: Good |
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, Total | Fishing; Propagation of Fish and Wildlife | 1996 | TMDL approved |
| Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs) | Fishing; Propagation of Fish and Wildlife; Contact Recreation; Drinking and Food Processing | 1996 | TMDL priority: Low |
| Mercury | Fishing | 2010 | TMDL priority: Low |
Probable sources named by the state
Each source below is listed under the cause the state filed it against, and carries the word the state filed with it — confirmed, or suspected.
- Phosphorus, Total
- Sources Outside State Jurisdiction or Borders (suspected) Impacts From Hydrostructure Flow Regulation/Modification (suspected)
- Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs)
- Contaminated Sediments (suspected)
- Mercury
- Atmospheric Deposition - Toxics (suspected)
Reading the record
Where Coosa River (Lay Lake) sits among peers
38% of Alabama's lakes assessed this deeply also came out mixed
Alabama ruled definitively on 5 designated uses at Coosa River (Lay Lake) and found 4 of 5 not supported. The dataset shows 94 Alabama lakes judged to that same depth.
Alabama's assessed lakes are most often judged on 4 uses; this one was judged on 5.
Computed share from EPA ATTAINS filed records, not an official EPA rating or safety grade.
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5+ | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All supported | 0 | 5 | 8 | 70 | 47 |
| Mixed | Not possible | 0 | 4 | 71 | 36 (this record) |
| None supported | 8 | 1 | 1 | 11 | 11 |
Ringed cell: Coosa River (Lay Lake). Source: EPA ATTAINS, Reporting cycles 1987–2026.
Scale and rank
Coosa River (Lay Lake) is one of 304 lake-type waterbodies reported to EPA from Alabama, and one of 263 whose reported record carries enough populated assessment or gauge data for this site to list and index it. At 698 assessed acres it ranks 2,947th 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 2,946 lakes with a larger one.
Reported trophic class
Eutrophic is the trophic class the filing agency reported to EPA ATTAINS for this assessment unit. It describes nutrient enrichment, not whether the water is safe, and it is not a PlainLakes inference. What the trophic scale measures.
In context
Where Coosa River (Lay Lake) 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
698 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
3 Longer than most more listed causes than 90% 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 Coosa River (Lay Lake). Hover or tap any bar for its full count and share.
In context
Alabama context
ATTAINS carries 304 lake-type waterbodies in Alabama, 143 assessed as not supporting at least one use and 130 fully supporting. Among the 263 indexed units there, Coosa River (Lay Lake) ranks 22nd by listed-cause count (3 listed causes) and 115th by assessed size among the 263 with an area filed; it sits in the not-supporting set (143 statewide) . Its listed causes include Phosphorus, Total; Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs); and Mercury, which also appear among Alabama's most-filed impairment causes (led by Mercury).
| Other large assessed lakes in Alabama | Assessed acres |
|---|---|
| Tennessee River (Lake Guntersville) Fully Supporting | 20,440 |
| Wheeler Lake Not Supporting | 18,705 |
| Tallapoosa River (Lake Martin) Fully Supporting | 15,867 |
| Coosa River (Weiss Lake) Not Supporting | 15,066 |
| Tennessee River (Wheeler Lake) Not Supporting | 13,441 |
| Tennessee River (Wilson Lake) Not Supporting | 13,363 |
Peers near Coosa River (Lay Lake)'s size or cause load
Similar assessed acres
Nearest filed extents (698 acres here).
- Loon · 698 acres · MN
- Nokay · 697 acres · MN
- Horse · 699 acres · MN
- Grass Lake · 699 acres · ND
Similar cause load
Nearest listed-cause counts (3 here). Peers already in the acreage column are omitted.
- 67th St. Beach · 3 causes · IL
- Abiquiu Reservoir · 3 causes · NM
- Absecon Creek (AC Reserviors) (gage to SB) · 3 causes · NJ
- Absecon Creek (below gage) · 3 causes · NJ
What to do with this record
- The listing here is on a fishery use, not on fish consumption, and this state reported no consumption verdict for this reservoir. Your state fish-advisory program is the source for whether the catch is safe to eat. 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 AL03150106-0810-102. 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.