North Dakota reservoir · state assessment record
Upper Des Lacs Reservoir
The assessment record reported by North Dakota to EPA under Clean Water Act sections 303(d) and 305(b).
- 4,249
- Assessed acres
- Reservoir
- Water type
This waterbody in one line
Upper Des Lacs Reservoir, a reservoir in North Dakota, has no overall assessment verdict in the state's most recent Integrated Report. By assessed acreage it sits among the largest 5% by assessed acreage nationally (38,628 lakes).
- Not reported
- overall status
- P98
- Assessed size nationally
Assessment verdicts are the state agency's decisions as reported to EPA ATTAINS; PlainLakes renders them without modification.
Upper Des Lacs Reservoir 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 Upper Des Lacs Reservoir nationally is assessed size: 4,249 acres, larger than 98% of the 38,628 lake-type units with an area on file.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's ATTAINS program, North Dakota carries 340 filed lake-type waterbodies in the August 2026 extract, and this page renders the assessment record EPA assigned to Upper Des Lacs Reservoir without modification. See our methodology for reporting-unit limits and gauge linking rules.
The record
Listed impairment causes
No causes are listed because this reservoir has no overall assessment verdict in the reported cycle. An unassessed waterbody is neither confirmed clean nor confirmed impaired.
Reading the record
What Upper Des Lacs Reservoir's record holds
Scale and rank
Upper Des Lacs Reservoir is one of 340 lake-type waterbodies reported to EPA from North Dakota. It is not among the 174 whose reported record carries enough populated assessment or gauge data for this site to list and index it. At 4,249 assessed acres it ranks 724th 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 723 lakes with a larger one.
Which uses were judged
North Dakota filed no use-level rows for this reservoir and reached no overall verdict, so nothing here was judged either way.
What this record holds
North Dakota filed no overall verdict, no reporting cycle and no EPA category for this reservoir, so the record holds the identifying fields above and no judgement of any kind: no verdict, and no impairment cause to track over time. The state has not yet filed a definitive fish-consumption verdict, a definitive recreation verdict, a definitive aquatic-life verdict, and 1 other for this record; those fields populate when it reports them in a future Integrated Report cycle.
In context
Where Upper Des Lacs Reservoir 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
4,249 Top 2% larger than 98% 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
In both charts each bar is a band and taller bars hold more waterbodies; the dashed line and filled bar mark Upper Des Lacs Reservoir. Hover or tap any bar for its full count and share.
In context
North Dakota context
ATTAINS carries 340 lake-type waterbodies in North Dakota, 52 assessed as not supporting at least one use and 143 fully supporting.
| Other large assessed lakes in North Dakota | Assessed acres |
|---|---|
| Lake Sakakawea Not Supporting | 318,821 |
| Devils Lake Not Supporting | 102,385 |
| Lake Oahe Fully Supporting | 68,123 |
| Little Missouri Bay (Lake Sakakawea) Not Supporting | 22,719 |
| Long Lake Refuge Not reported | 16,990 |
| Lake Audubon Fully Supporting | 16,610 |
Lakes near Upper Des Lacs Reservoir's assessed acres
Similar assessed acres
Nearest filed extents (4,249 acres here).
- Indian Lake · 4,248 acres · NY
- Lewisville Lake · 4,250 acres · TX
- Okatibbee Lake · 4,243 acres · MS
- Lake Livingston · 4,259 acres · TX
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 ND-09010002-003-L_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.