Pioneer Water Service, MT
Lead reported as not detected
Latest 90th-percentile lead: reported as 0 (not detected) (monitoring period 2025-2027). 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
Pioneer Water Service serves about 900 people through 1 service connections, which makes it a small system under EPA's size classes. It is privately owned and draws surface water, in Yellowstone County, Montana. EPA system ID: MT0004226; phone on file: 406-252-8860. Ask them for your address in their service line inventory - every system had to publish one by Oct 2024.
Pioneer Water Service's lead record
That is down 2 ppb from 2 ppb in the period ending 2021. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Pioneer Water Service is 2 ppb across 4 monitoring periods, none of them over 15 ppb.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2027 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2021 | 2 ppb |
| 2018 | 0.23 ppb |
| 2016 | 0 (not detected) |
Against other Montana systems
Of the 753 Montana systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 1 ppb; 5 are over 15 ppb right now and 28 have gone over at some point. Pioneer Water Service's reported as 0 (not detected) sits at the 36th percentile in Montana and the 26th nationally (higher means more lead). Systems reporting 0 tie at the bottom, so the rank mostly reflects size among them.
Nearby utilities
45 other systems share Yellowstone County; 21 of them have a higher latest lead result than Pioneer Water Service. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Billings City Of | 114,000 | 3 ppb |
| Billings Heights Co Water Dist Of | 12,000 | 3 ppb |
| Laurel Municipal Water System | 6,339 | 2 ppb |
| Lockwood Water And Sewer District | 5,900 | 3 ppb |
| Go 2 U Water Delivery | 875 | 0 (not detected) |
| Worden Ballantine Yellowstone | 800 | 3 ppb |
| Fisher Water Service | 750 | 0 (not detected) |
| Cherry Creek Estates Llc | 600 | 0 (not detected) |
| Windsor Estates | 530 | 1 ppb |
| Pryor Creek Water Assn | 475 | 1 ppb |
Next steps for Billings, MT
Look up your address in Pioneer Water Service'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 Pioneer Water Service 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.