Santa Juana Dam
near Vallenar, Chile
Santa Juana Dam (Spanish: Embalse Santa Juana) is a dam on the Huasco River and associated artificial lake, 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) southeast of the city of Vallenar, Atacama Region and 530 km north of Santiago, Chile.
In 1953 the Department of Hydraulics of the Ministry of Public Works established a camp to study the construction of the dam. With the establishment of the dam being discussed for decades, the final decision to build it came after a drought that lasted from 1988 to 1990. The dam was initially planned to be located just 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) downstream Alto del Carmen, but planners later moved the project downstream to its current location, where work began in 1991. The dam filled to full capacity for the first time in 1997 during a flood event.
The dam has contributed significantly to the agricultural development in the areas upstream of the river since periods of water scarcity no longer result in immediate water use restrictions for upstream users, given that downstream users are supplied by the dam.
The public source identifies “Santa Juana Dam” as near Vallenar, Chile. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Santa, Juana and Vallenar.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 29, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q11681436. The first chronological checks are 1953, 1988, 1990 and 1991.
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This entry incorporates text from “Santa Juana Dam” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.