Chatuge Dam is located above the mouth of the Hiwassee River, just north of the North Carolina-Georgia state line. Chatuge Lake extends southward for along the Hiwassee and eastward for roughly along Shooting Creek, which once emptied into the Hiwassee immediately upstream from the dam site. The dam and the North Carolina section of the reservoir are surrounded by the Nantahala National Forest, and the Georgia section of the reservoir is surrounded by the Chattahoochee National Forest. Hayesville, North Carolina and Hiawassee, Georgia are the nearest communities of note.
Capacity
Chatuge Dam is an earth-and-rock dam high and long, and has a generating capacity of 10,000 kilowatts. The dam's concrete overflow "ski-jump" spillway consists of 50 bays with a combined discharge of. Chatuge Lake has a flood storage capacity of and of shoreline. Water passes Chatuge Dam via the dam's intake tower, from which a steel conduit carries the water under the dam and empties it downstream.
Background and construction
Various private entities recognized the hydroelectric potential of the Hiwassee in the early 1900s, although plans for dams were typically focused further downstream from the Chatuge site. After taking control of flood control operations in the valley in the 1930s, the Tennessee Valley Authority built Hiwassee Dam and carried out an extensive survey of the river in which they identified the Chatuge site. The outbreak of World War II in Europe brought an emergency demand for electricity, mainly to power aluminum production in East Tennessee, and TVA offered to meet this demand by building a series of dams on the Hiwassee and several other Tennessee River tributaries. The Chatuge Dam project, along with several other dam projects, was authorized July 16, 1941. Work on the dam began the following day. The construction of Chatuge Dam and its reservoir required the purchase of of land, of which had to be cleared. 278 families, 532 graves, and of roads had to be relocated. TVA kept the dam's design simple and relied on basic building materials in order to complete the dam as quickly as possible in hopes of allowing the reservoir to collect the 1941-1942 winter rains. The dam was constructed of impervious earthen fill fortified on both sides by riprap. The spillway was the only major part of the dam that required concrete. Since the reservoir would fill slowly and create mosquito-breeding environments, various measures were taken to prevent malaria outbreaks. Chatuge Dam was completed and its gates closed on February 12, 1942. The cost of the whole project was just over $9 million. For most of its early years, Chatuge was operated as a flood storage unit in conjunction with nearby Nottely Dam to regulate water flow at Hiwassee Dam downstream. A small generator was installed at Chatuge in 1954.
