Virginia reservoir · state assessment record
Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek)
Assessment decisions reported by Virginia to EPA under Clean Water Act sections 303(d) and 305(b), last assessed in the 2026 reporting cycle, a cycle that is open for public comment.
- 213
- Assessed acres
- Reservoir
- Water type
- Mesotrophic
- Reported trophic class
This waterbody in one line
Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek), a reservoir in 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 (2026), a cycle that is open for public comment. 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). Fish consumption is assessed as not supporting.
- Not Supporting
- overall status
- P82
- Assessed size nationally
- P20
- Shorter cause list
- Not Supporting
- fish consumption
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.
Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek) 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 Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek) nationally is assessed size: 213.2 acres, larger than 82% of the 38,628 lake-type units with an area on file.
Every filed use falls short
On the uses this filer ruled on, fish consumption, every determination is Not Supporting. That is a use-by-use reading of the filed record, not a single overall lake grade.
Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek): Category 4A reading
Category 4A means a TMDL (or equivalent) is already approved for the impairment on Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek). 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 Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek) 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, Virginia carries 275 filed lake-type waterbodies in the August 2026 extract, and this page renders the assessment record EPA assigned to Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek) 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. Virginia 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Fish Consumption | Fish-consumption or fishery | Not Supporting Filer confidence: Good |
| Aquatic Life | Aquatic-life or related | Not Assessed |
| Public Water Supply | Drinking-water supply designation | Not Assessed |
| Recreation | Recreation | Not Assessed |
| Wildlife | Other | Not Assessed |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| PCBs in Fish Tissue | Fish Consumption | 2006 | TMDL approved |
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.
- PCBs in Fish Tissue
- Atmospheric Deposition (confirmed) Contaminated Sediments (confirmed) Industrial Point Source Discharge (confirmed)
Reading the record
Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek): Category 4A reading
4A Category 4A: impaired, TMDL completed
Virginia 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
Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek) is one of 275 lake-type waterbodies reported to EPA from Virginia, and one of 193 whose reported record carries enough populated assessment or gauge data for this site to list and index it. At 213 assessed acres it ranks 6,840th 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 6,839 lakes with a larger one.
Still unfiled
The state has not yet filed a definitive recreation verdict and a definitive aquatic-life verdict for this record; those fields populate when it reports them in a future Integrated Report cycle.
Reported trophic class
Mesotrophic 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 Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek) 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
213 Top 18% larger than 82% 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 Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek). Hover or tap any bar for its full count and share.
In context
Virginia context
ATTAINS carries 275 lake-type waterbodies in Virginia, 181 assessed as not supporting at least one use and 50 fully supporting. Among the 193 indexed units there, Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek) ranks 117th by listed-cause count (one listed cause) and 83rd by assessed size among the 193 with an area filed; it sits in the not-supporting set (181 statewide) . Its listed causes include PCBs in Fish Tissue, which also appears among Virginia's most-filed impairment causes (led by PCBs in Fish Tissue).
| Other large assessed lakes in Virginia | Assessed acres |
|---|---|
| Kerr Reservoir Assessment unit VAW-L75L_ROA05M22 Not Supporting | 14,828 |
| Kerr Reservoir Assessment unit VAW-L75L_ROA05L98 Not Supporting | 7,018 |
| Kerr Reservoir Assessment unit VAW-L75L_ROA05N22 Not Supporting | 4,182 |
| Lake Drummond Not Supporting | 3,242 |
| Lake Chesdin Not Supporting | 3,164 |
| Lake Gaston Not Supporting | 3,072 |
Peers near Smith Mtn. Lake (Bettys Creek)'s size or cause load
Similar assessed acres
Nearest filed extents (213 acres here).
- Big Doctor Lake · 213 acres · WI
- Bostwick Lake · 213 acres · MI
- East Sunburg · 213 acres · MN
- Clear Lake · 213 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
- The fish-consumption use is assessed as not supporting. Before eating fish from this reservoir, check your state fish-advisory program for species-specific meal limits. 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 VAW-L07L_BTT01A10. 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.