DeSoto, Texas
What is the Water Quality in DeSoto, Texas?
Compared to other US cities, DeSoto water quality ranks in the high range for contamination excluding Lead.
Most of their 36 contaminants have cancer-causing attributes.
- Arsenic is at very high levels: 74x health guidelines.
Let’s look closer at what’s in DeSoto water.
What’s in DeSoto water?
Here are the top 5 chemical compounds in your water and what health issues they can potentially cause:
- Arsenic – Potential effect: Cancer
- Bromochloroacetic acid
- Chloroform – Potential effect: Cancer
- Hexavalent Chromium – Potential effect: Cancer
- Haloacetic acids (HAA5) – Potential effect: Cancer
These are five of the 36 contaminants analyzed by the Environmental Working Group (ewg.org).
15 of these contaminants are rated as exceeding EWG Health Guidelines.
Does DeSoto have Lead contamination?
Yes, DeSoto has lead in its water. The most recent Lead samples collected in 2018 showed concentrations up to 1.0 parts per billion (ppb).
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 DeSoto’s water come from?
DeSoto’s water comes from the Headwaters Tenmile Creek watershed.
There are no known water sources in the Headwaters Tenmile Creek watershed.
Ideally, a water source would be Known and rated in Good condition.
Learn more from How’s My Waterway
See below for what you can do to improve DeSoto’s water.
What Can You Do?
Information about water quality in DeSoto 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 78.1% of contaminants in your drinking water.
- Berkey filters can also remove up to 99.99% of Lead in DeSoto water.
- Brita can filter 18 contaminants and Lead depending on the filter.
- Regular Brita filters will not remove Arsenic, Cyanide, or Nitrates.
- Note: We may receive a commission if you decide to purchase filters through links on this page.
- To filter out 32 of the 36 contaminants (88.9%), 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
- Atrazine – herbicide
- Barium
- Chloromethane
- Chromium (hexavalent)
- Chromium (total)
- Cyanide
- Haloacetic acids
- Nitrate
- Nitrite
- Selenium
- Strontium
- Total trihalomethanes (TTHMs)
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: http://www.ci.desoto.tx.us/683/Government to find contact information for your local officials.