New Research Claims that Lake Tahoe is the Oldest in Northern America

New research has revealed that Lake Tahoe is the oldest lake in North America and the third oldest in the world, as presented at the Geological Society of America’s annual meeting in Anaheim.

According to Winnie Kortemeier, a geosciences professor at Western Nevada College, Lake Tahoe is at least 2.3 million years old. She initially discovered this in 2012 by radiometric dating volcanic rock samples collected near Tahoe City.

Last year, during her sabbatical, Kortemeier expanded her research to compare Tahoe with other ancient lakes, confirming its age.

The world’s oldest lake is Lake Baikal in Siberia, estimated to be between 5 and 10.3 million years old. The second oldest is Lake Tanganyika in East Africa, at around 8 to 10 million years old. Lake Tahoe now ranks as the third oldest, according to Kortemeier’s research.

The research began by studying volcanic rocks in the Tahoe City area, where Kortemeier discovered that this region’s geology differs from the rest of the lake, which is mostly granite. The volcanic rocks indicate lava flows occurred 2.3 million, 2 million, and 920,000 years ago. This means Lake Tahoe existed during those ancient eruptions.

Right now, nearby Clear Lake takes the moniker of the oldest lake in North America at 480,000 years old. But does Tahoe now take that crown? We’ll let the professionals debate…