Coosa River vs. Tennessee River

[BigMitch]

How is it that the Tennessee river reservoirs water temps stay 5+ degrees higher than the coosa river's reservoirs? I have heard that bc of current lake guntersville does not form a thermocline. And I know chickamauga has stayed consistently warmer than lake weiss this year. Is this normal? Hopefully, someone can provide some insight or atleast a theory???

 

[mallardecho]

Where do you think all of that electricity they produce goes to? Answer; big water heaters upstream..That is why the TN river is warmer. Well it is a theory...........

 

[SNUFFY]

your theory is close mallard head.....the heaters are called John Sevier,Kingston, and Bull Run coal fired steam plants....Watts Bar and Sequoyah Nuclear.....
I doubt they raise the Chic 5 degrees at the dam in the winter ....but I don`t know that for sure.....

 

[Rock Buster]

Most of the year (except the winter) I think it is more due to the fact that there are no gates on the lake Dams upstream that form the Coosa (Carters lake and Allatoona). Carters lake is over 400 feet deep at the dam and the water coming out of it is from DEEEEEP and in the 50's even in August, and Allatoona is over 100 feet deep at the dam and the water coming out of it is less than 70 all the time. This water warmes up significantly by the time it gets to Weiss but is still wayyyy cooler than if they had gates open and were pouring the warm water from the top of carters or Toona. I am not sure about Chick, but I think Nickajack has one or more gates open almost all the time so Guntersville is getting a lot of the warm water from the top of Nickajack Lake.

Thats my theory on it for the warmer months. If the Coosa is colder in the winter too it must have something to do with the Nuclear plants on the TN I would guess.

 

[Guest]

I think RockBuster is on to something. TN dams releases are not as deep and pretty much flow steadily. While Coosa's dams are much deeper.

 

[beetlespin]

What are the two main influences on water temperature? I would say air temperature and light penetration by far. Most TN river lakes are relatively clear so light penetration is much deeper therefore the water warms faster. I have fished weiss and neely henry fairly estensively and logan martin once and all of them are brown. I think light penetration is the biggest factor.

Lance

 

[Guest]

Actually stained water will warm up faster than clear water, more particals to absorb the warmth. So I don't think light penetration has much to do with it.

It is matter of surface area to volume ratio and also the rentention time of the water.

 

[beetlespin]

You might want to go research that.

 

[polo-dog]

R14 is correct, the more stain in the water the faster it warms up. If the water entering the lake is really cold all year round the water in the lakes below the dams will be affected by it. The Hiwasee river comes out from the bottom of the lake above it and is very cold even in the summer. I would expect that on the average that Weiss being farther south should warm up earlier than the TN river lakes. If the water that runs into Weiss is mostly spring fed or is from the bottom of the upstream resiviors that is probably the reason for it to be cooler if it is that way every year. If Guntersville never gets a thermocline then you would expect that the surface temp would be cooler in Guntersville, not warmer because the cooler water from below would be mixed with the warmer surface water. I would expect that like Chickamauga, there is a thermocline but maybe not as dramatic a one as there would be if there were no current running through the lake.