Vieux Pré Lake, Pierre Percée, Lorraine

When the decision to build a nuclear plant in Cattenom was made in 1979, engineers worried about its cooling. Cattenom is to the board of the Moselle river, near of the Luxembourg border. The Moselle and its tributary (the Meurthe river) have an irregular throughput, not sufficient to ensure this cooling. It was then decided to create 150km upstream a tank to regulate this debit : this is the role of Vieux Pré lake.

The dam was built by EDF between 1981 and 1985 at a place called Vieux Pré. It was commissioned in 1993. The dam is 78m high and is made of trapp stone, which is the hardest European rock, does not freeze, is not permeable, and which career is very close (Raon - L’Etape). The heart of the dam is composed of clay and sandstone. The width is 355 metres at the base and 8 metres to the 330m long ridge.

The maximum water volume is estimated at 61.6 million m3, to a maximum depth of 80 m.

The flooded area consists of several valleys, giving the Lake the form of a maple leaf.