Monday, November 24, 2014

Work to Temporarily Close Bagnell Dam - Bus.54

- Ameren UE will temporarily close Bagnell Dam on Business Route 54 in Miller County to inspect flood gates on the dam. The dam will be closed to traffic between 7 a.m. and at 5 p.m. Monday, December 1 through Thursday, December 4. 

We spotted what looked like new rake gates loaded onto trucks which would account for the rare shutdown of the entire road.

Monday, November 03, 2014

Updated - October 2014 Lake Levels

It's time to introduce a new data element to the monthly lake level chart and that is discharge, the amount of flow in cubic feet per second passing through the penstocks of the dam (indicated by green vertical bars). There is no indication of how many turbines are being spun up by this water discharge, but Ameren is restricted to a total daily flow maximum of 37,500cfs and a minimum of about 900cfs. Discharge rates above the minimum are indicative of generating electrical power.


One of the interesting relationships is that between flow and lake levels.  By tracking both lake level and discharge rates we can clearly see lake levels recovering quickly in-between power generating periods.  It is also clear that if conditions are correct, lake levels can continue to rise while discharge remains robust, for example on 10/15/2014 lake level trends remained upward while discharge was relatively high.  Larger versions of the graphs will also now be available.  Full_size_Oct2014.jpg