Augusta, IL
Lead detected, under the action levels
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 4.3 ppb (monitoring period 2025-2025). The federal action level is 15 ppb today and drops to 10 ppb in Nov 2027; EPA's health goal is 0. Lead was measured in sampled homes but the 90th percentile is under both action levels. EPA's health goal for lead is zero, so test your own tap if your home was built before 1986 or anyone in it is pregnant or a young child.
Who runs the water here
Augusta serves about 553 people through 299 service connections, which makes it a small system under EPA's size classes. It is owned by a local government (city, town, county or district) and draws groundwater, in Hancock County, Illinois. EPA system ID: IL0670050; phone on file: 309-392-2576. They can tell you what your service line is made of and whether they pay to replace it.
Every lead result on file
That is up 4.3 ppb from 0 ppb in the period ending 2024. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Augusta is 4.3 ppb across 4 monitoring periods, none of them over 15 ppb.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 4.3 ppb |
| 2024 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2021 | 1.61 ppb |
| 2018 | 1.51 ppb |
How Augusta compares
Of the 1,744 Illinois systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 0 ppb; 22 are over 15 ppb right now and 152 have gone over at some point. Augusta's 4.3 ppb sits at the 85th percentile in Illinois and the 89th nationally (higher means more lead).
Other water systems in Hancock County
10 other systems share Hancock County; 1 of them has a higher latest lead result than Augusta. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Hamilton | 2,753 | 0 (not detected) |
| Carthage | 2,510 | 0 (not detected) |
| Warsaw | 1,480 | 2.9 ppb |
| Laharpe | 1,200 | 0 (not detected) |
| Nauvoo | 1,200 | 2.4 ppb |
| Dallas City | 788 | 0 (not detected) |
| Bowen | 494 | 1 ppb |
| Plymouth | 460 | 10 ppb |
| West Point | 248 | 0 (not detected) |
| Elvaston | 165 | 0 (not detected) |
Your move
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Augusta, IL may offer free or low-cost kits through the utility. If your own line is lead, replacing the private side runs about $1,200-$12,300 (EPA average about $4,700). Ask Augusta whether it covers that cost before hiring anyone - many utilities now do.
These figures describe homes the utility sampled, not your tap. Only your service line record or a test of your own water answers the question for your house. What a 90th-percentile result does and does not tell you: how to read a lead result. The action level is dropping - the 10 ppb rule from 2027.