Jocassee Dam

Jocassee Dam (often called Lake Jocassee Dam) is an embankment dam on the Keowee River, straddling the border of Pickens and Oconee counties in South Carolina in the United States. The dam forms Lake Jocassee, which is fed by the Toxaway, Thompson, Horsepasture and Whitewater Rivers, and serves primarily for hydroelectric power generation and flood control. The dam and reservoir are part of the Keowee-Toxaway Hydroelectric Project, owned and operated by Duke Energy.

Completed in 1973, the dam is a zoned earth and rock fill structure, standing 385 ft high with a crest length of 1800 ft. At full pool, the reservoir has a storage capacity of 1185000 acre feet, encompassing 75 mi of shoreline and 7500 acre. Floodwater is released through a spillway controlled by two 40 x gates, with a capacity of 45700 cuft/s.

The dam supports a 710 MW hydroelectric station, generating power from four turbines. Two of the turbines were installed in 1973, while the third and fourth units came online in 1975. The power station functions as a pumped-storage operation designed to provide peaking power, and generates an average of 811 e6kWh per year. The dam is shown under construction in the 1972 thriller film Deliverance.