ASCE Historic Award Plaque Unveiling
COST: There is no charge to visit the park after Labor Day
This is only the THIRD ASCE History and Heritage Award in the South Carolina Section history (and only the 2nd in South Carolina as the Augusta Canal is listed under GA)!
When completed in 1930, the Dreher Shoals Dam was the largest earthen dam in the United States and generated 166 Megawatts of hydroelectric power to help electrify the South. The dam featured the unique semi-hydraulic fill construction method that created a dense clay core then deemed “more impervious to water than concrete.” At 1.5 miles long, 213 feet high, and a volume of 11 million cubic yards, the dam created Lake Murray, then the largest reservoir for hydroelectric power production, which is 41 miles long, 14 miles wide, and holds 2.2 million acre-feet of water.
The Land was purchased and design started in 1925. Though the chief engineer was from New York City, much of the detailed design was performed by The Citadel senior design students. The original Dreher Shoals Dam Hydroelectric Project was also referred to as Saluda Dam, Saluda River Dam, and Lake Murray Dam or the Saluda River Hydroelectric Development Project. The dam includes an emergency spillway that is 2,900 feet long, controlled by four steel Tainter gates [a type of radial-arm floodgate used to control water flow]. Because of seismic stability concerns, a Roller-Compacted Concrete (RCC) dam with rockfill wing embankments was constructed as a “backup dam” downstream of the original embankment dam in 2005, and it is 213 feet (65 meters) high. The RCC portion of the backup dam is 2,300 ft (700 m) long and the rockfill wing embankments total 5,700 ft long.
The hydroelectric power plant originally generated 222,600 horsepower (166,100 kW) of output, serving the entire Southeastern United States, and it made South Carolina the fifth ranking state in the production of hydroelectric power in 1930. In 1971, South Carolina Electric and Gas Company (SCE&G), now Dominion Energy, installed a fifth turbine and more than doubled the output of the powerplant. The embankment dam used locally available native red clay soil and excavated bedrock, with an additional steel sheet pile wall on the upstream side of the dam crest. The maximum upstream-downstream width of the embankment at the bottom is 1,210 feet (369 meters); see the cross-section figure below. It is still the largest dam in South Carolina, impounding the 48,000-acre (194 million m2) lower piedmont reservoir (Lake Murray), and is second only to the Fairfield Pump and Store facility (completed in 1978) in generating hydroelectric power in South Carolina.
Upon entering the park, visitors should head toward the dam (left), where we will be set up.
Lake Murray Park Site 8, better known as the boat ramp on the north (Irmo) side of the dam. Address is 2101 North Lake Drive, Columbia, SC.