What's in York County, PA tap water?
York County sits about 75 miles from our Arlington base and is served primarily by York Water Co, which provides water to roughly 207,000 people. It draws from the Piedmont reservoirs, rivers & wells. Piedmont and northern-Maryland communities draw from a mix of reservoirs, rivers (including the Susquehanna and Monocacy) and groundwater wells. Chlorination byproducts plus agricultural and industrial runoff drive most of the contaminants that exceed EWG's health guidelines.
Find a local installerYork Water Co water quality report, explained
What testing of York Water Co water shows for York County, compared with EWG's health guidelines. Being above a guideline is not a legal violation.
Primary water system (EPA)
York Water Co
Serves about 207,000 people
Contaminants EWG most often flags above its health guidelines for the Piedmont reservoirs, rivers & wells:
Larger areas have more than one water system. Enter your exact zip code below for your utility's own EPA record and EWG report.
Measured by the EPA · York County, PA
York County, PA tap water is fully legal.
It is also 80× the health standard for lead.
York Water Co runs York County's water, drawing from surface water and supplying about 206,762 people through 68,414 service connections. A system that size runs a long distribution network, and water spends days in it between the plant and the tap.
Surface water needs heavy disinfection, and chlorine reacting with organic matter in the river is what creates trihalomethanes and haloacetic acids. Those are the contaminants that most often sit above health guidelines here, and they form in the pipes after treatment rather than at the plant.
Every federal limit that applies here is met. Those limits weigh what removal costs. EWG says its health standards are “based only on protecting health and does not consider technical feasibility or the cost of water treatment”. Here is how far apart the two are.
Harm to the brain and nervous system · EPA limit 10 ppb (action level, lowered from 15 ppb, in force November 2027)— also above this
Lead was measured above the federal limit too. Compliance is judged on a running annual average rather than a single sample, so this is not a violation — but it is the number EPA itself set as the line.
It was tested for 29 PFAS compounds in the EPA's latest round and none came back above reporting limits — genuinely good news, and a single window in time. Lead sampling put the ninetieth percentile at 16 ppb — meaning nine in ten homes tested below that, and one in ten above it. York Water Co has 8 violations on file with the EPA, 1 of them health-based.
York Water Co, on the EPA's record
- Source
- surface water
- Connections served
- 68,414
- People served
- 206,762
- Violations on file
- 8 (1 health-based)
How this water is treated before it reaches you
Treatment makes water safe to distribute. It is not designed to remove PFAS, and chlorine-based disinfection creates byproducts of its own.
Levels: EPA Fifth Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule (UCMR5, 2023–2025) for PFAS, and the Lead and Copper Rule 90th-percentile result for lead and copper — the highest reported for York Water Co. Health standards: EWG's published drinking water standards, updated February 2025. Levels vary by sampling point and date, and being above a health standard is not a legal violation.
10 contaminants above EWG's health guidelines
Everything EWG found above its guideline in York County's water, from testing in 2013-2023. A level can be under the legal limit and still be listed here: EWG's guidelines are set to protect health, not to be easy to meet.
| Contaminant | In this water | EWG guideline | Times over |
|---|---|---|---|
| Haloacetic acids (HAA9) | 28.5 ppb | 0.06 ppb | 475× |
| Haloacetic acids (HAA5) | 22.3 ppb | 0.1 ppb | 223× |
| Total trihalomethanes (TTHMs) | 29.3 ppb | 0.15 ppb | 196× |
| Bromodichloromethane | 6.26 ppb | 0.06 ppb | 104× |
| Trichloroacetic acid | 9.69 ppb | 0.1 ppb | 97× |
| Dichloroacetic acid | 12.6 ppb | 0.2 ppb | 63× |
| Chloroform | 22.0 ppb | 0.4 ppb | 55× |
| Nitrate | 3.52 ppm | 0.14 ppm | 25× |
| Dibromochloromethane | 1.04 ppb | 0.1 ppb | 10× |
| Chromium (hexavalent) | 0.0924 ppb | 0.02 ppb | 4.6× |
Source: EWG Tap Water Database, York Water Co (PA7670100).
The fix for York County water
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Common in U.S. tap water
York County water quality FAQ
Is York County, PA tap water safe to drink?
Public water in York County meets federal EPA legal limits. But "legal" is not the same as "clean": across the Piedmont reservoirs, rivers & wells, independent testing routinely finds contaminants like total trihalomethanes (TTHMs) and haloacetic acids (HAA5) above EWG's stricter health guidelines. Enter your zip code above to see your exact utility's record.
What contaminants are common in York County water?
For the Piedmont reservoirs, rivers & wells, the contaminants that most often exceed health guidelines are total trihalomethanes (TTHMs), haloacetic acids (HAA5), nitrates (agricultural runoff), hexavalent chromium (chromium-6) and PFAS (forever chemicals). Your specific levels depend on your utility, which you can look up by zip code above.
Does Sanavia install reverse osmosis systems in York County?
Yes. York County is roughly 75 miles from our Arlington base and inside our service area. A Sanavia Hydra reverse osmosis system installs under your sink and reduces every contaminant class above, and we'll mail you a free water test kit.
Where does York County tap water come from?
York County's primary public water system is York Water Co, which serves roughly 207,000 people. It sits in the Piedmont reservoirs, rivers & wells, so its water shares that region's contaminant profile. Larger areas may have more than one utility, so enter your exact zip code above for your own system's EPA record.
Is well water in York County tested for these contaminants?
No. Private wells are not covered by municipal testing, so the responsibility falls on the homeowner. If your York County home is on a well, nitrate and naturally occurring contaminants are worth testing for specifically, and a reverse osmosis system reduces them at the tap. We'll mail you a free water test kit either way.
Contaminants common in the Piedmont reservoirs, rivers & wells
Each of these is a plain-English guide to a contaminant class common in York County and the surrounding Piedmont reservoirs, rivers & wells — what it is, the health context, and what actually removes it.
Reverse osmosis in York County, PA
York Water Co treats this water to the federal standard, yet the contaminants listed above still exceed EWG’s stricter health guidelines — Total trihalomethanes (TTHMs), Haloacetic acids (HAA5), Nitrates (agricultural runoff) and 2 more. Most of them either pass straight through treatment or form after the plant, in the pipes between it and the tap, which is why the fix has to be at the tap as well.
PFAS is the reason a carbon pitcher is not enough here. The compounds do not break down, they are measured in parts per trillion, and the federal limit that covers them is not enforceable until 2029. A reverse osmosis membrane is one of the few things at household scale that reduces them rather than passing them through.
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Full testing record for York County · Find a local installer
Detailed city water reports
For the largest DC-metro utilities we publish the full measured contaminant table.
Nearby areas we serve
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