Essex Pws, MO
Lead reported as not detected
Latest 90th-percentile lead: reported as 0 (not detected) (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. The latest 90th-percentile result was reported as 0 (not detected at the lab's limit). That says the sampled homes were low, not that your home has no lead service line. Check your utility's service line inventory for your address.
Who runs the water here
Essex Pws serves about 399 people through 260 service connections, which makes it a very small system under EPA's size classes. It is owned by a local government (city, town, county or district) and draws groundwater, in Stoddard County, Missouri. EPA system ID: MO4010255; phone on file: 573-283-5990. They can tell you what your service line is made of and whether they pay to replace it.
Every lead result on file
Against the period ending 2022 (0 ppb) the latest result is about the same. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Essex Pws is 3.94 ppb across 6 monitoring periods, none of them over 15 ppb.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2022 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2022 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2019 | 3.94 ppb |
| 2019 | 3.94 ppb |
| 2016 | 0 (not detected) |
Against other Missouri systems
Of the 1,674 Missouri systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 1.04 ppb; 2 are over 15 ppb right now and 74 have gone over at some point. Essex Pws's reported as 0 (not detected) sits at the 21st percentile in Missouri and the 21st nationally (higher means more lead). Systems reporting 0 tie at the bottom, so the rank mostly reflects size among them.
Neighbouring systems
15 other systems share Stoddard County; 12 of them have a higher latest lead result than Essex Pws. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Dexter Pws | 8,200 | 2.03 ppb |
| Stoddard County Pwsd 1 | 3,000 | 1.52 ppb |
| Bloomfield Pws | 1,980 | 0 (not detected) |
| Bernie Pws | 1,898 | 6.43 ppb |
| Stoddard County Pwsd 4 | 1,530 | 11.5 ppb |
| Advance Pws | 1,400 | 3.1 ppb |
| Puxico Pws | 890 | 0 (not detected) |
| Stoddard County Pwsd 6 | 840 | 1.16 ppb |
| Stoddard County Pwsd 5 | 650 | 0 (not detected) |
| Stoddard County Pwsd 7 | 500 | 0.98 ppb |
Your move
Look up your address in Essex Pws's service line inventory. If it says lead, galvanized or unknown, test your tap. If your own line is lead, replacing the private side runs about $1,200-$12,300 (EPA average about $4,700). Ask Essex Pws 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. The lead result guide covers how utilities pick the homes they sample. Small systems behave differently: why small systems go over more often.