VOLTA, LAKE

artificial lake in Ghana. The lake is formed by the Akosombo Dam (q.v.), which, begun in 1961 and completed in 1965, dammed the Volta River just south of Ajena and created a lake extending upstream from the Akosombo Dam to Yapei, beyond the former confluence of the Black Volta and White Volta rivers. With a storage capacity of 124,000,000 acre-feet (153,000,000,000 cubic m) of water, Lake Volta is one of the largest man-made lakes in the world. It is about 250 miles (400 km) long and covers 3,283 square miles (8,502 square km), or 3.6 percent of Ghana's area. The lake's creation involved the inundation of 15,000 homes and of 740 villages and the resettlement of 78,000 people. The lake is navigable and provides a cheap route linking Ghana's northern savanna with the coast. It also is a major fishing ground and provides irrigation water for farmland in the dry Accra Plains lying immediately below the damsite. The generating capacity of the dam's hydroelectric power plant is 912 megawatts of electricity; this power is used by the aluminum smelter located at the port of Tema on the Gulf of Guinea and supplies most of Ghana's other electricity needs as well.