Elephant Butte, City Of, NM
Lead detected, under the action levels
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 1.9 ppb (monitoring period 2026-2028). 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.
Elephant Butte, City Of at a glance
Elephant Butte, City Of serves about 1,350 people through 634 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 Sierra County, New Mexico. EPA system ID: NM3573627; phone on file: 575-744-4892. They can tell you what your service line is made of and whether they pay to replace it.
Lead results over time
Against the period ending 2025 (1.2 ppb) the latest result is about the same. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Elephant Butte, City Of is 1.9 ppb across 5 monitoring periods, none of them over 15 ppb.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2028 | 1.9 ppb |
| 2025 | 1.2 ppb |
| 2022 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2019 | 1.8 ppb |
| 2016 | 1.3 ppb |
Against other New Mexico systems
Of the 504 New Mexico systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 1.4 ppb; 14 are over 15 ppb right now and 46 have gone over at some point. Elephant Butte, City Of's 1.9 ppb sits at the 56th percentile in New Mexico and the 69th nationally (higher means more lead).
Nearby utilities
5 other systems share Sierra County; 1 of them has a higher latest lead result than Elephant Butte, City Of. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Truth Or Consequences | 6,783 | 1.1 ppb |
| Elephant Butte Water System | 2,286 | 0 (not detected) |
| Hillsboro Mdwca | 172 | 2.7 ppb |
| Caballo Lake Mdwca | 102 | 0 (not detected) |
| Desertaire Water Company | 45 | 0 (not detected) |
What to do in your house
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Elephant Butte, NM 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 Elephant Butte, City Of 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.