Detroit Lakes drinking water meets all EPA goals; far below actionable limits

Detroit Lakes, Minn. (KDLM) – Detroit Lakes Public Utilities released its 2022 drinking water report this week and the city’s tap water meets all of the Environmental Protection Agency guidelines for safe and drinkable water.

In 20 randomly tested homes, lead and copper concentrations were less than 2 ppb and 0.8 ppm, respectively, in more than 90 % of the homes surveyed; far below actionable thresholds set by the EPA.

2022 Detroit Lakes Drinking Water Report by Michael Achterling on Scribd

Vernell Roberts, general manager of Detroit Lakes Public Utilities, said he isn’t surprised city has great water because they have deep wells and the water reports have been pretty consistent for the past two decades.

“We do have really good drinking water in this town and we are very fortunate and part of that comes from the deep aquifer that our wells reside in,” said Roberts. “Our wells are 200 feet deep and it’s what we call ‘old water.’ It hasn’t been exposed to a lot of air contaminants, or natural contaminants that one would typically think of with a shallow well … the treatment process takes all the iron out, it does not take the hardness out, or the calcium, or the minerals, but other than that our water is actually really good and that’s simply because of the wells we have and how deep the wells are.”

Nitrates, contaminants relating to disinfection and other substances, like fluoride, all measured far below EPA limits and even lower than the agency’s suggested goals for each compound.

Roberts also said, in most cases where they find some lead particulates at a home within the city limits, it’s usually because it’s an older home with lead solder in some of their plumbing joints.

“We do treatment to prevent leeching with lead pipes and most of the time when we see lead in households it comes from older houses,” he said. “Older Houses still have lead solder in copper joints inside plumbing, inside of a house. That’s normally where most of the lead comes from.”

He also had some words for people who only buy bottled water.

“One thing that’s really interesting about the consumer confidence report is that all public utilities that provide drinking water have to release these reports in one form or another,” said Roberts. “But, when people go to the store and buy bottled water, they don’t get these reports on any of the bottled water they buy. They don’t know what’s in that bottled water, but we’ll tell you what’s in your drinking water in a community like Detroit Lakes. So that’s one of the benefits of having a public water supply is we disclose what we find in our water and the people that make bottled water don’t have to do that. And you really never know what you are getting.”

Detroit Lakes , MN (KDLM)-

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