The

Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency The Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency ( nl, Planbureau voor de Leefomgeving - abbr. ''PBL'') is a Dutch research institute that advises the Dutch government on environmental policy and regional planning issues. The research fields includ ...

published in 2010 a map of surface water bodies in the Netherlands. It distinguishes over 20 different types. There are water bodies with salty, brackish and sweet water; natural and artificial lakes by size, peat puddles and fens. The combined surface of the lakes larger than 50 hectares is 2,500 square kilometers. A comprehensive list of past and present lakes in the Netherlands is not available, selected lists are.

Groups of lakes

There are several groups of lakes or lake systems that are frequently described as a whole. Examples are: *

Frisian Lakes The Frisian Lakes consists of 24 lakes in central and southwest Friesland, a province of the Netherlands located in the northern part of the country. The lakes There are many large and small lakes in the Frisian Lakes area, plus a number of them t ...

, a group of 24 lakes in the province of

Friesland Friesland (, ; official fry, Fryslân ), historically and traditionally known as Frisia, is a province of the Netherlands located in the country's northern part. It is situated west of Groningen, northwest of Drenthe and Overijssel, north of ...

* Borderling lakes, a body of water surrounding the

Flevopolder The Flevopolder is an island polder forming the bulk of Flevoland, a province of the Netherlands. Created by land reclamation, its northeastern part was drained in 1955 and the remainder—the southwest—in 1968. Boundaries Unlike other major p ...

often divided in ten parts or lakes

Lakes

The following is a list of

lake A lake is an area filled with water, localized in a basin, surrounded by land, and distinct from any river or other outlet that serves to feed or drain the lake. Lakes lie on land and are not part of the ocean, although, like the much large ...

s of the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

Ancient lakes

The waterscape of the Netherlands is in continuous change. The following is a list of historical lakes in the Netherlands: *

Haarlemmermeer Haarlemmermeer () is a municipality in the west of the Netherlands, in the province of North Holland. Haarlemmermeer is a polder, consisting of land reclaimed from water. The name Haarlemmermeer means 'Haarlem's lake', referring to the body of wate ...

* Lake Almere *

Lake Flevo Lake Flevo was a lake in what is now the Netherlands, which existed in Roman times and the early Middle Ages. Some geographers believe that this lake was not really a single lake, rather a set of several lakes connected to each other. From the ...

* Purmer

References

{{Europe topic, List of lakes of *

Lakes