The dam's purpose includes flood mitigation, irrigation, water supply and hydro-electric power generation.

The dam impounds Lake Burrendong and is filled by the waters from the Macquarie, and Cudgegong rivers as well as Meroo Creek.

[1] The spillway on the dam is a gated concrete chute with a release capacity of 13,720 cubic metres per second (485,000 cu ft/s).

Contrastingly, however, Burrendong has mitigated potentially devastating floods downstream by using its flood capacity and releasing water in accordance with downstream tributary flows, safely reaching 160% of capacity in 1990 and 152.8% in 2010[citation needed].

[1][11] A hydro-electric power station generates up to 19 megawatts (25,000 hp) of electricity from the flow of the water leaving Burrendong Dam.

[9] The station was completed in August 1996 and was officially opened on 9 February 1999 by the Premier of New South Wales, Bob Carr.