Idaho lake · state assessment record
Lake Lowell
Assessment decisions reported by Idaho to EPA under Clean Water Act sections 303(d) and 305(b), last assessed in the 2014 reporting cycle.
- 6,059
- Assessed acres
- Lake, Freshwater
- Water type
- Eutrophic
- Reported trophic class
This waterbody in one line
Lake Lowell, a lake in Idaho, is assessed as not supporting one or more designated uses, with one listed impairment cause in the state's most recent Integrated Report cycle (2014). By assessed acreage it sits among the largest 1% of assessed lakes nationally (38,628 lakes with a filed area); 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
- P99
- 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 Lake Lowell'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 Lake Lowell nationally is assessed size: 6,059 acres, larger than 99% 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, aquatic life, every determination is Not Supporting. That is a use-by-use reading of the filed record, not a single overall lake grade.
Lake Lowell: Category 4A reading
Category 4A means a TMDL (or equivalent) is already approved for the impairment on Lake Lowell. The remaining work is implementation and tracking, read the cleanup-standing and cause rows for what the state already committed to address.
Overall status: not supporting
The filer's overall status for Lake Lowell 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, Idaho carries 630 filed lake-type waterbodies in the August 2026 extract, and this page renders the assessment record EPA assigned to Lake Lowell 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. Idaho filed its own confidence on the one definitive verdict 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Warm Water Aquatic Life | Aquatic-life or related | Not Supporting Filer confidence: Good |
| Aesthetic | Other | Not Assessed |
| Agricultural Water Supply | Other | Not Assessed |
| Cold Water Aquatic Life | Aquatic-life or related | Not Assessed |
| Industrial Water Supply | Other | Not Assessed |
| Primary Contact Recreation | Recreation | Not Assessed |
| Wildlife Habitat | Other | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Phosphorus, Total | Warm Water Aquatic Life | 2010 | TMDL approved |
Reading the record
Lake Lowell: Category 4A reading
4A Category 4A: impaired, TMDL completed
Idaho filed this assessment unit as Category 4A: impaired, with a pollutant-budget TMDL already completed under 303(d). The listing remains an impairment finding; the plan is on file rather than still awaiting write-up.
Scale and rank
Lake Lowell is one of 630 lake-type waterbodies reported to EPA from Idaho, and one of 186 whose reported record carries enough populated assessment or gauge data for this site to list and index it. At 6,059 assessed acres it ranks 516th 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 515 lakes with a larger one.
Still unfiled
The state has not yet filed a definitive fish-consumption verdict and a definitive recreation verdict for this record; those fields populate when it reports them in a future Integrated Report cycle.
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.
Why no water-level record
Lake Lowell has no daily USGS water-level or reservoir-storage series on this page because NWIS lists a lake monitoring site named for the waterbody, but the site is not active, and PlainLakes ingests only the active inventory, so there is no series to attach. How PlainLakes links gauges.
In context
Where Lake Lowell 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
6,059 Top 1% larger than 99% 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 Lake Lowell. Hover or tap any bar for its full count and share.
In context
Idaho context
ATTAINS carries 630 lake-type waterbodies in Idaho, 51 assessed as not supporting at least one use and 198 fully supporting. Among the 186 indexed units there, Lake Lowell ranks 27th by listed-cause count (one listed cause) and 7th by assessed size among the 186 with an area filed; it sits in the not-supporting set (51 statewide) . Its listed causes include Phosphorus, Total, which also appears among Idaho's most-filed impairment causes (led by Phosphorus, Total).
| Other large assessed lakes in Idaho | Assessed acres |
|---|---|
| Pend Oreille Lake Not Supporting | 80,829 |
| Bear Lake Not Assessed | 34,454 |
| American Falls Reservoir (Snake River) Not Supporting | 31,724 |
| Cascade Reservoir Not Supporting | 25,040 |
| American Falls Reservoir (Snake River) Tribal Waters Not Assessed | 23,785 |
| Grays Lake Not Assessed | 23,678 |
Peers near Lake Lowell's size or cause load
Similar assessed acres
Nearest filed extents (6,059 acres here).
- Lanier Lake · 6,059 acres · GA
- Pushaw Stream · 6,058 acres · ME
- Waldo Lake · 6,062 acres · OR
- Big Sandy · 6,056 acres · MN
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 ID17050114SW004_06. 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.