Copper Basin Utility District, TN
Lead detected, under the action levels
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 0.5 ppb (monitoring period 2023-2025). 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.
Copper Basin Utility District at a glance
Copper Basin Utility District serves about 2,710 people through 1,221 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 surface water, in Polk County, Tennessee. EPA system ID: TN0000844; phone on file: 423-496-5744. Call that number and ask whether your address has a lead, galvanized or unknown service line.
Every lead result on file
Against the period ending 2022 (0.5 ppb) the latest result is about the same. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Copper Basin Utility District is 0.5 ppb across 4 monitoring periods, none of them over 15 ppb.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 0.5 ppb |
| 2022 | 0.5 ppb |
| 2019 | 0.5 ppb |
| 2016 | 0.5 ppb |
How Copper Basin Utility District compares
Of the 453 Tennessee systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 1 ppb; 0 are over 15 ppb right now and 10 have gone over at some point. Copper Basin Utility District's 0.5 ppb sits at the 13th percentile in Tennessee and the 43rd nationally (higher means more lead).
Nearby utilities
3 other systems share Polk County; 3 of them have a higher latest lead result than Copper Basin Utility District. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Benton Water System | 2,580 | 1 ppb |
| Copperhill Water Dept | 1,217 | 1 ppb |
| Cherokee Hills U.D. | 258 | 12.09 ppb |
What to do in your house
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Turtletown, TN 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 Copper Basin Utility District 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.