Lac du Lauvitel is a lake in the commune of Le Bourg-d'Oisans in the

Isère Isère ( , ; frp, Isera; oc, Isèra, ) is a landlocked department in the southeastern French region of Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes. Named after the river Isère, it had a population of 1,271,166 in 2019.France. At an elevation of 1530 m, the lake has a surface area of 0.35 km². It is situated in the Vénéon valley. It is the largest lake of the Écrins massif and forms one slope of the Oisans region. The lake is accessible by foot from the nearby town of la Danchère. The southern part of the lake and valley are classified as part of a "réserve naturelle intégrale" since 1995. This classification aims to preserve such areas in their natural state as if entirely unaffected by human activity. This restricted area is forbidden to visitors and is instead reserved exclusively for scientific research, having been recognised in 2012 as an essential protected area for its scientific importance according to an assessment by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Geography

The surface of the lake is approximately 25 to 35 hectares, reaching 65 m in depth. The natural water-retaining dam appeared approximately 4000 years ago, when a rockslide added material on top of a pre-existing glacial

moraine A moraine is any accumulation of unconsolidated debris (regolith and rock), sometimes referred to as glacial till, that occurs in both currently and formerly glaciated regions, and that has been previously carried along by a glacier or ice shee ...

. For most of the year, no surface water escapes from the lake. In winter, the thickness of the surface ice layer surpasses one meter. During periods of snowmelt,

meltwater Meltwater is water released by the melting of snow or ice, including glacial ice, tabular icebergs and ice shelves over oceans. Meltwater is often found in the ablation zone of glaciers, where the rate of snow cover is reducing. Meltwater can be ...

overflow from the surrounding summits is well over the porous flow capacity of the lake barrier. As a result, the depth of the lake can increase by 20 m compared to its summer level, before overflowing.

References

Lauvitel Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region articles needing translation from French Wikipedia {{Isère-geo-stub