Stowe Water Dept, VT
Above the new 10 ppb level coming in 2027
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 14.3 ppb (monitoring period 2021-2023). The federal action level is 15 ppb today and drops to 10 ppb in Nov 2027; EPA's health goal is 0. Under the current 15 ppb rule this is not an exceedance, but it is above the 10 ppb action level that takes over in Nov 2027. Test your own tap; filter if your result shows lead.
About Stowe Water Dept
Stowe Water Dept serves about 3,600 people through 1,370 service connections, which makes it a medium-sized system under EPA's size classes. It is owned by a local government (city, town, county or district) and draws groundwater, in Lamoille County, Vermont. EPA system ID: VT0005163; phone on file: 802-253-8770. Call that number and ask whether your address has a lead, galvanized or unknown service line.
Stowe Water Dept's lead record
That is up 9.7 ppb from 4.6 ppb in the period ending 2022. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Stowe Water Dept is 14.3 ppb across 6 monitoring periods, none of them over 15 ppb (1 over 10 ppb).
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2023 | 14.3 ppb over 10 |
| 2022 | 4.6 ppb |
| 2020 | 4.6 ppb |
| 2019 | 7.1 ppb |
| 2017 | 7.1 ppb |
| 2016 | 4 ppb |
Against other Vermont systems
Of the 372 Vermont systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 1.4 ppb; 7 are over 15 ppb right now and 65 have gone over at some point. Stowe Water Dept's 14.3 ppb sits at the 98th percentile in Vermont and the 99th nationally (higher means more lead).
Other water systems in Lamoille County
21 other systems share Lamoille County; 1 of them has a higher latest lead result than Stowe Water Dept. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Smugglers Notch Water System | 2,960 | 4.9 ppb |
| Morrisville Water And Light | 2,935 | 2.4 ppb |
| Johnson Village Water Dept | 1,350 | 2.2 ppb |
| Jeffersonville Water System | 700 | 0 (not detected) |
| Hyde Park Water System | 462 | 0 (not detected) |
| Sterling View Cooperative Community Inc | 290 | 0 (not detected) |
| Hyde Park Fire District 1 | 275 | 0 (not detected) |
| Cambridge Village Water | 262 | 0 (not detected) |
| Mountainside Resort | 240 | 2.7 ppb |
| Notchbrook Condominium | 201 | 0 (not detected) |
Next steps for Stowe, VT
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Stowe, VT 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 Stowe Water Dept 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. This system is in the band the 2027 10 ppb rule changes.