Lake Powell is one of the largest artificially created lakes in the world. It lies on the Utah-Arizona border. Glen Canyon Dam, built across Glen Canyon to generate hydroelectric power, created Lake Powell. The lake was named after Major John Wesley Powell, who discovered and named Glen Canyon. The dam blocks the Colorado River to form a lake 186 miles (299 kilometers) long and up to 400 feet (122 meters) deep at its deepest point. Lake Powell has the capacity to hold about 27 million acre-feet (33 billion cubic meters) of water. Most of the lake is in Utah. The town of Page, Arizona, was built alongside Glen Canyon Dam to house construction workers. Lake Powell became a popular recreation area.
Glen Canyon Dam was completed in 1964. Lake Powell filled to its capacity by the early 1980’s. However, record drought and high regional water usage in the early decades of the 2000’s left the reservoir filled to only a fraction of its capacity.
