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Is Portales, NM tap water safe?

2 utilities serve Portales, by EPA’s records. Here is what EPA’s and New Mexico’s records show for each, against the legal limits and the stricter health goals.

Matched to your utility using EPA records.

The short answer

1 of the 2 utilities serving Portales has a result above a legal limit or action level, or a health-based violation since 2016, in EPA’s and New Mexico’s records: Roosevelt County WUA.

Portales Water System, which serves the most people here, has 2 results above the health goal and 1 result above EPA’s health benchmark. The worst: Lithium at 128 ppb, above EPA’s health benchmark. Health goals are stricter than legal limits and are not enforced.

A town can be served by more than one utility, and some homes are on private wells. The name on your water bill tells you which is yours, and your ZIP code narrows it down. They are listed by how many people each serves in Portales’s ZIP codes, from EPA’s estimates.

What handles it

Each of these is certified, on a certifier’s listing, for a result above a line in Portales Water System’s water, which serves the most people here. Another utility’s report names what handles its own results.

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Every claim, and more filters, in the full report

Water testing near Portales

A utility tests the water it sends out. A test of your own tap shows what your pipes add, and on a private well it is the only test there is. It takes a lab New Mexico certifies.

The lab New Mexico certifies closest to Portales, in a straight line. Call first: certification is test by test, and not every lab takes samples from homeowners.

  • EPCOR Water

    Clovis, NM · about 26 miles

    Certified for bacteria

    (575) 763-5538

New Mexico Environment Department: Water fairs in New Mexico communities, where well owners bring in a quart of well water to be tested for arsenic, nitrate, fluoride, iron, sulfate, pH and conductivity, with results mailed in two to four weeks. Dates are on the department's calendar. Water Fairs, New Mexico Environment Department.

All 44 certified labs for New Mexico

ZIP codes in Portales

Which ZIP codes are in Portales: Census 2020 relationship files. Which utilities serve them, and how many people: EPA SDWIS and EPA’s service area map. Each utility’s results: EPA UCMR 5, EPA SDWIS, and EPA’s and the state’s compliance monitoring, as its report lists them. How they are measured: methodology. Certified labs: New Mexico Environment Department, Drinking Water Bureau, laboratories certified to analyze drinking water samples; distances from the Census 2020 ZIP code tabulation area gazetteer.

Near Portales

Towns nearby with a page of their own.

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