Ryan Dam

Ryan Dam is a hydroelectric dam on the Missouri River, 10 miles (16 km) downstream from the city of Great Falls in the U.S. state of Montana. The dam is 1,336 feet (407 m) long and 61 feet (19 m) high; its reservoir is 7 miles (11 km) long and has a storage capacity of 5,000 acre feet (6,200,000 m³). It is a run-of-river dam. The dam is built on the largest of the five Great Falls of the Missouri, the "Big Falls",[2] also sometimes called "Great Falls".[2] Since 1915, the six-unit powerhouse on the left side of the dam has occupied a significant portion of the 87-foot (27 m) high waterfall.

Ryan Dam
Location	Cascade County, Montana, USA
Coordinates	47°34′10″N 111°07′29″W
Construction began	1915
Owner(s)	NorthWestern Corporation
Dam and spillways
Impounds	Missouri River
Height	61 ft
Length	1,336 ft
Reservoir
Total capacity	5,000 acre feet (6,200,000 m^3)
Power Station
Installed capacity	60 megawatts (80,000 hp)
Annual generation	441,430,000 KWh (2009)[1]

The dam, built just upstream of the falls and a small island named Ryan Island, is divided into two parts. On the right side of the dam is a concrete-arch spillway structure, that when functioning, releases water over the remains of the waterfall. The center part of the dam consists of a dike that extends from the falls' base to Ryan Island (separating the tailrace from the main river, which it meets a few hundred yards downstream). It also contains a concrete gravity structure facing towards the right bank of the river and tilted to face slightly downstream. This segment of the dam contains the outlet works, a water jet that bursts out and cascades over the waterfall. The left side of the dam is a large powerhouse topped by a concrete gravity structure.

Montana Power Company originally built the dam, PPL Corporation purchased it in 1997 and sold it to NorthWestern Corporation in 2014. Since the dam's construction in the Missouri River gorge, it has flooded a fair portion of the Great Falls - the cascades between Grand Fall and Crooked Falls, which lies several miles upstream - and reduced the flow over Great Falls to such an extent that much of the bedrock is visible. The dam was constructed on top of a 10-foot (3.0 m) cascade that Lewis and Clark observed to lie just upstream of Grand Fall. Upstream of Ryan Dam the next dam is Cochrane Dam, then Rainbow Dam, and the uppermost is Black Eagle Dam. Downstream of Ryan Dam the next dam is Morony Dam.

References

1. "Ryan". Carbon Monitoring for Action. Retrieved 2018-04-26.
2. "Big Falls". Geographic Names Information System. United States Geological Survey. Retrieved January 4, 2017.

• Ryan Dam at pplmontana.com