Buford Dam · Chattahoochee River · GA
Lake Lanier
Metro Atlanta's water supply and the prize in a three-state water war that ran for three decades.
Water surface elevation
1,064.1 ft
US Army Corps, hourly · Oct 2, 3:00 AM EDT
Water in storage
1.70 million acre-feet
US Army Corps, hourly · Oct 2, 3:15 AM EDT
Share of conservation capacity
86.9% full
against the retrieved 2026-09-17 conservation capacity figure (USACE CWMS location level SAM/Buford.Stor.Inst.0.Top of Conservation)
Below full pool
7.0 ft
full pool at 1,071.0 ft
30-day trend
-1,767 af/day
storage, 2026-08-18 → 2026-09-17; over the year -359 af/day. Measured change, not a forecast.
Drought at the dam
D0 — Abnormally dry
US Drought Monitor at the dam's coordinates, released 2026-09-17; the feeding basin can differ.
Flood space left
1.94 million acre-feet
room above today's storage up to the Corps' flood-control ceiling, same total-volume basis
86.9% full
of conservation capacity, by storage (retrieved 2026-09-17 figure, USACE CWMS location level SAM/Buford.Stor.Inst.0.Top of Conservation). Sedimentation slowly shrinks real capacity.
The water line is elevation (USACE project datum); the percentage is storage ÷ capacity. They are different measures — a reservoir's volume is not linear in its depth, so the line's height in this column is not the percentage.
The last 120 days
Daily water-surface elevation in feet. The axis hugs the data — it does not start at zero. Source: committed snapshot (USACE CWMS, retrieved 2026-09-17).
See the numbers as a table
| Date | Elevation (ft) |
|---|---|
| Sep 17 | 1064.85 |
| Sep 16 | 1064.87 |
| Sep 15 | 1064.94 |
| Sep 14 | 1065.00 |
| Sep 13 | 1065.07 |
| Sep 12 | 1065.08 |
| Sep 11 | 1065.03 |
| Sep 10 | 1065.07 |
| Sep 9 | 1065.14 |
| Sep 8 | 1065.20 |
| Sep 7 | 1065.30 |
| Sep 6 | 1065.36 |
| Sep 5 | 1065.41 |
| Sep 4 | 1065.43 |
| Sep 3 | 1065.51 |
| Sep 2 | 1065.54 |
| Sep 1 | 1065.58 |
| Aug 31 | 1065.65 |
| Aug 30 | 1065.73 |
| Aug 29 | 1065.77 |
| Aug 28 | 1065.76 |
| Aug 27 | 1065.84 |
| Aug 26 | 1065.89 |
| Aug 25 | 1065.94 |
| Aug 24 | 1065.99 |
| Aug 23 | 1066.08 |
| Aug 22 | 1066.14 |
| Aug 21 | 1066.18 |
| Aug 20 | 1066.21 |
| Aug 19 | 1066.28 |
Most recent 30 days shown.
Where these numbers come from
Readings at Lake Lanier are the measuring agencies' own: each value above names its source (USGS gage, Bureau of Reclamation daily record, Army Corps project data, or this desk's committed copy) and its observation time in the reservoir's own time zone. The conservation capacity figure is the retrieved 2026-09-17 USACE CWMS location level SAM/Buford.Stor.Inst.0.Top of Conservation number — its basis: top of conservation pool (Corps location level, total-volume basis); summer value of a seasonal guide curve; sedimentation slowly shrinks real capacity, so the vintage travels with the percent.