Perth Amboy, New Jersey
What is the Water Quality in Perth Amboy, New Jersey?
Compared to other US cities, Perth Amboy water quality ranks in the high range for contamination excluding Lead.
Most of their 30 contaminants have cancer-causing attributes.
- Radium is at extremely high levels: 60x health guidelines.
- Perth Amboy also has PFOS and PFOA in its water supply.
- These “forever chemicals” are difficult to break down and can even be found in bottled water.
- However, they can be removed using home water filters.
Let’s look closer at what’s in Perth Amboy water.
What’s in Perth Amboy water?
Here are the top 6 chemical compounds in your water and what health issues they can potentially cause:
- Arsenic – Potential effect: Cancer
- Bromodichloromethane – Potential effect: Cancer
- Chloroform – Potential effect: Cancer
- Hexavalent Chromium – Potential effect: Cancer
- Haloacetic acids (HAA5) – Potential effect: Cancer
- Total trihalomethanes – Potential effect: Cancer
These are six of the 30 contaminants analyzed by the Environmental Working Group (ewg.org).
15 of these contaminants are rated as exceeding EWG Health Guidelines.
Does Perth Amboy have Lead contamination?
Yes, Perth Amboy has lead in its water. The most recent Lead samples collected in 2019 showed concentrations up to 21.5 parts per billion.
The legal limit for lead is 15 parts per billion. Being well-below this level is a good thing.
Concentrations between 3.8 ppb and 15 ppb put a formula-fed baby at risk of elevated blood lead levels. Read more about the symptoms of Lead in water.
There is no safe level of lead for humans.
The good news is that 99.99% of the lead can be filtered out.
See the What Can You Do? section below to learn how to filter out contaminants.
Where does Perth Amboy’s water come from?
Perth Amboy’s water comes from the Woodbridge Creek – Arthur Kill watershed.
Six of the nine water sources in the Woodbridge Creek – Arthur Kill watershed are in Impaired or Unknown condition. These include:
- Arthur Kill waterfront (below Grasselli) – Impaired
- Arthur Kill North and South and minor tributaries – Impaired
- Woodbridge Creek – Impaired
Ideally, a water source would be rated in Good condition. Three water sources in the watershed are in good condition:
- Minor Staten Island tributaries
- Ohrback Lake
- Richmond Creek, Upper, and tributaries
Learn more from How’s My Waterway
See below for what you can do to improve Perth Amboy’s water.
What Can You Do?
Information about water quality in Perth Amboy can be surprising and downright scary.
But there are things you can do in your home to clean up your water.
To Remove Lead and Other Contaminants In Your Home:
There is one solution that beats Brita, PUR, and expensive whole house systems.
- It costs less per gallon.
- Needs fewer filter changes.
- And it doesn’t make your water taste weird.
- Use Berkey filters with activated carbon to filter out at least 88% of contaminants in your drinking water.
- Berkey filters can also remove up to 99.99% of Lead in Perth Amboy water.
- Berkey filters will also remove PFOA and PFOS.
- Brita can filter 14 contaminants, PFOA, PFOS, and Lead depending on the filter.
- Note: We may receive a commission if you decide to purchase filters through links on this page.
- To filter out 28 of the 30 contaminants, consider a Reverse Osmosis water filtration system for your house.
- These are typically more expensive than pitchers to purchase, but are much more effective.
- They have the benefit of filtering out heavy hitters like:
- Arsenic – health effects in water
- Chloroform
- Cobalt
- Hexavalent Chromium – health effects
- Nitrate
- PFOA
- PFOS
- Radium
- Selenium
- Strontium
- Thallium
In Your Community:
Contact your local government officials and put pressure on them to invest in cleaner waterways and upgraded city water filtration and treatment.
Go to: https://perthamboynj.org/ to find contact information for your local officials.