A reservoir has a surface area of 50.0 km² and an average depth of 40.0 m. What mass of water is held behind the dam? (See Figure 11.4 for a view of a large reservoir—the Three Gorges Dam site on the Yangtze River in central China.)

Strategy

We can calculate the volume of the reservoir from its dimensions, and find the density of water in Table 11.1. Then the mass can be found from the definition of density.

Data given in Table 11.1