Relief Dam is a rockfill dam on Summit Creek, a tributary of the

Middle Fork Stanislaus River The Middle Fork Stanislaus River is a tributary of the Stanislaus River in the central Sierra Nevada and Stanislaus National Forest of eastern California. Geography The river begins at the confluence of Kennedy Creek and Summit Creek in the Em ...

, in

Tuolumne County Tuolumne County (), officially the County of Tuolumne, is a county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 55,620. The county seat and only incorporated city is Sonora. Tuolumne County comprises the ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. The dam is part of the Spring Gap-Stanislaus Hydroelectric Project, and is owned and operated by

Pacific Gas and Electric The Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) is an American investor-owned utility (IOU). The company is headquartered at Kaiser Center, in Oakland, California. PG&E provides natural gas and electricity to 5.2 million households in the norther ...

(PG&E). Completed in 1910, the dam stands above the riverbed and is long at the crest. Altogether it contains of fill. The dam forms Relief Reservoir, which has a storage capacity of of water and a full surface area of . The

drainage basin A drainage basin is an area of land in which all flowing surface water converges to a single point, such as a river mouth, or flows into another body of water, such as a lake or ocean. A basin is separated from adjacent basins by a perimeter, ...

behind the dam totals . The reservoir is primarily drawn down in the late summer and fall to supplement flows to the hydroelectric powerhouses at Donnells Dam and Beardsley Dam (part of the separate PG&E Tri-Dam Project) and others on the Stanislaus River.

References

Dams in California Dams on the Stanislaus River Dams completed in 1910 Rock-filled dams Buildings and structures in Tuolumne County, California {{dam-stub