Some of these decisions are EPA's. 8 of these 434 records carry a Clean Water Act cleanup plan EPA established rather than West Virginia. They are counted in every figure on this page, and each record page names which.
State water-quality picture · #22 by reported lake-type waterbodies
West Virginia lakes and reservoirs
Every figure on this page is computed from the assessment decisions West Virginia reported to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency under Clean Water Act sections 303(d) and 305(b) (reporting cycles 1996–2024), plus daily water-level observations from the U.S. Geological Survey.
- 434
- Reported waterbodies
- 44
- Not supporting a use
- 20
- Fish use not supporting
- 0
- Gauged lakes
West Virginia in one line
434 lake-type waterbodies in West Virginia are reported to EPA ATTAINS across reporting cycles 1996–2024: 44 assessed as not supporting at least one designated use, 31 fully supporting, and 359 without a definitive overall verdict. The most-listed impairment cause is Methylmercury in Fish Tissue, on 19 waterbodies.
- 434
- reported waterbodies
- 44
- not supporting a use
- 31
- fully supporting
- 59%
- of definitive verdicts impaired
An unassessed waterbody is neither confirmed clean nor confirmed impaired; states assess on multi-year cycles. 1 of those 31 fully supporting verdicts rest on designated uses this site does not report (irrigation, navigation and industrial water supply), with West Virginia recording no verdict on fish consumption, recreation, aquatic life and drinking water. They are counted above because the state filed them, and excluded from the impaired share below because that figure compares states.
West Virginia has no USGS gauge network to draw on
West Virginia reports zero USGS stream/lake gauges. None of the state's 434 lake-type units can carry a gauge link as a result — every gauge-based comparison on this page reads as unmonitored, not merely low.
Data updated 2026-08-17
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's ATTAINS program, West Virginia reported 434 lake-type waterbodies in West Virginia in the August 2026 extract. See our methodology for filer attribution and multi-year reporting cycles.
Overall-status mix on West Virginia's mid-size inventory
Every reported lake-type unit in West Virginia falls into exactly one overall-status bucket. This bar is the inventory partition; the cause chart and national gauge below answer different questions.
Most-listed impairment causes in West Virginia
Waterbodies carrying each listed cause, most first
- Methylmercury in Fish Tissue
Methylmercury in Fish Tissue
19 waterbodies
- Phosphorus
Phosphorus
18 waterbodies
- Chlorophyll-a
Chlorophyll-a
10 waterbodies
- Sedimentation/Siltation
Sedimentation/Siltation
8 waterbodies
- Trophic State Index (Tsi) 5
Trophic State Index (Tsi)
5 waterbodies
What this shows Methylmercury in Fish Tissue is the most-listed impairment cause in West Virginia, on 19 of the lake-type waterbodies reported there.
Computed share from EPA ATTAINS filed records, not an official EPA rating or safety grade.
West Virginia: 59% of ruled verdicts are not-supporting, against a national share of 53%, 1.1× the national rate.
Reporting practice
Most of West Virginia's inventory still lacks a definitive verdict
Each reporting authority decides how much of the water it files to EPA it actually assesses in a cycle. That decision sets the denominator behind every count on this page.
West Virginia holds the 22nd-largest reported lake-type inventory in the country, 434 assessment units, carrying a definitive verdict on 17.1% of it. The counts above describe the 74 units carrying a verdict, not all 434 reported. West Virginia has also retired 145 lake-type assessment units, superseded filings that are kept on the site but not counted here.
The states reporting at the nearest rates are Indiana (15.2%) and Alaska (20.8%).
Assessing more of an inventory is a reporting choice, set by cycle length, monitoring budget and how finely a state splits its waters into units. It is not a measure of water quality, and it is why a raw count from one state does not sit beside a raw count from another. How assessment coverage varies.
West Virginia against every comparable state
Share of reported lake-type waterbodies carrying a definitive verdict
17.1% 45th of 47 higher than 2 of 47 states
the 47 comparable states, by definitive-verdict share
Each bar is a band; taller bars hold more states. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count and share, and where it sits relative to this entry.
Source EPA ATTAINS · Reporting cycles 1987–2026
Each bar counts states whose definitive-verdict share falls in that 10-point band. The 47 states shown are those reporting at least 25 lake-type units; a share off a smaller inventory is precision the data does not have.
By size
Largest assessed lakes in West Virginia
By assessed acreage as reported in ATTAINS. Acreage is the assessed unit's size, which can differ from a lake's full surface area.
| # | Waterbody | Assessed acres |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tygart Lake Not Assessed | 1,852 |
| 2 | Cheat Lake Not Supporting | 1,440 |
| 3 | Summersville Lake (d) Not Supporting | 1,305 |
| 4 | Stonewall Jackson Lake (c) Not Supporting | 1,168 |
| 5 | Mount Storm Lake Fully Supporting | 1,167 |
| 6 | Sutton Lake (c) Not Supporting | 944 |
| 7 | Stonewall Jackson Lake (d) Not Supporting | 864 |
| 8 | Jennings Randolph Lake (Bloomington Lake) Not Assessed | 741 |
| 9 | Bluestone Lake (a) Not Assessed | 679 |
| 10 | Summersville Lake (e) Not Supporting | 672 |
| 11 | Summersville Lake (a) Not Supporting | 606 |
| 12 | Stonecoal Reservoir Not Assessed | 600 |
By cause count
Most-listed waterbodies in West Virginia
Waterbodies carrying the most listed impairment causes among the lake-type units reported by West Virginia.
| # | Waterbody | Listed causes |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Turkey Run Lake Not Supporting | 5 |
| 2 | Ridenour Lake Not Supporting | 4 |
| 3 | Bear Rock Lake No. 1 Not Supporting | 3 |
| 3 | Castleman Run Lake Not Supporting | 3 |
| 3 | Hurricane Water Supply Reservoir Not Supporting | 3 |
| 6 | Barboursville Lake Not Supporting | 2 |
| 6 | Bear Rock Lake No. 2 Not Supporting | 2 |
| 6 | Elk Fork Lake Not Supporting | 2 |
| 6 | Krodel Lake Not Supporting | 2 |
| 6 | Parker Hollow Lake Not Supporting | 2 |
8 of the 10 rows in this table tie on the ranked value: 3 at 3 (rank 3), 5 at 2 (rank 6). Tied rows share a rank and are listed in no meaningful order; where a tie reaches the top the medal is shared, because nothing separates those rows.
States with similar inventory scale or impairment load
Two EPA ATTAINS peer sets outside West Virginia. The reporting-practice chart above stays on definitive-verdict share; these neighborhoods are cross-state nearest neighbors on register size and not-supporting counts.
Similar reported inventory
Nearest states by lake-type units on the register (434 here).
- Oklahoma · 456 units · 22 off
- Texas · 489 units · 55 off
- Iowa · 371 units · 63 off
- Pennsylvania · 516 units · 82 off
States with a similar not-supporting load
Nearest states by units assessed not supporting a use (44 here). Inventory peers above are omitted.
- Connecticut · 44 not supporting · 0 off
- New Mexico · 46 not supporting · 2 off
- Georgia · 47 not supporting · 3 off
- Delaware · 40 not supporting · 4 off
Peers are nearest-neighbor matches on EPA ATTAINS register size and not-supporting counts among states with at least 25 reported units. Impairment peers skip states already listed in the inventory column so the two link sets stay distinct.
Using this state picture
- Comparisons across states hold on shares, not counts: 17.1% of the inventory reported from West Virginia carries a definitive verdict, 45th of 47 comparable states. National rankings
- Fish-consumption verdicts here are assessment decisions. Species-level meal advice comes from the state fish-advisory program. Consumption guide
- Browse every named West Virginia waterbody with a populated record. Browse waterbodies
PlainLakes renders state assessment decisions and federal gauge observations without modification.
Figures on this page are computed from the assessment decisions West Virginia reported to EPA's ATTAINS system and from USGS National Water Information System daily values, no number is typed in by an editor. State counts aggregate every lake-type assessment unit reported by West Virginia, including unnamed units that never receive their own page. 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.