Blue Springs, Missouri

What is the Water Quality in Blue Springs, Missouri?

[Updated: June 13, 2023]

Compared to other US cities, Blue Springs water quality ranks in the lower-middle range for contamination excluding Lead.

Most of their 18 contaminants have cancer-causing attributes.

• Haloacetic acids (HAA5) are at extremely high levels: 134x health guidelines.
• Haloacetic acids (HAA9) are at extremely high levels: 261x health guidelines.
  • HAA5 and HAA9 are byproducts of chlorine treatment, a common method of disinfecting water supplies.

Let’s look closer at what’s in Blue Springs water.

What’s in Blue Springs water?

Here are the top 5 chemical compounds in the water and what health issues they can potentially cause:

1. Chloroform – Potential effect: Cancer
2. Haloacetic acids (HAA5) – Potential effect: Cancer
3. Haloacetic acids (HAA9) – Potential effect: Cancer
4. Hexavalent chromium – Potential effect: Cancer
5. Total trihalomethanes – Potential effect: Cancer

These are five of the 18 contaminants analyzed by the Environmental Working Group (ewg.org).

11 of the 18 contaminants are rated as exceeding EWG Health Guidelines.

Does Blue Springs have Lead contamination?

Yes, Blue Springs has lead in its water. The most recent Lead samples collected from 2016 through 2018 showed concentrations up to 1.5 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 Blue Springs’s water come from?

Blue Springs’s water comes from the Swiney Branch – Sni-A-Bar Creek watershed.

The water sources in the Swiney Branch – Sni-A-Bar Creek watershed are in Impaired or Unknown condition. These are:

• 100K Extent-Remaining Lakes
• Sni-A-Bar Creek

Ideally, a water source would be rated in Good condition.

Learn more from How’s My Waterway

See below for what you can do to improve Blue Springs’s water.

Conclusion – What Can You Do?

Information about water quality in Blue Springs can be surprising.

But there are things you can do in your home to clean up your water.

1. Test Your Water using Varify Home Test Kits or similar.
2. To Remove Lead and Other Contaminants In Your Home:

• Use Activated Carbon filters to remove most contaminants in your drinking water.
  • Faucet-mount filters work better than pitchers.
  • PUR and Brita are low-cost and effective.

• To filter out even more contaminants, consider a reverse osmosis water filtration system for your house.
  • • These are more expensive than pitchers to purchase, but are more effective.
    • They have the benefit of filtering out heavy hitters like:
      • Bromochloroacetic acid
      • Bromodichloromethane – health risks in drinking water
      • Chloroform – side effects
      • Chromium (total)
      • Dibromochloromethane
      • Dichloroacetic acid
      • Haloacetic acids (HAA5 and HAA9) – chlorination byproduct*
      • Hexavalent chromium – health effects
      • Molybdenum
      • Strontium
      • Total trihalomethanes – byproduct of chlorination*
      • Trichloroacetic acid
    • Our recommendation: APEC Reverse Osmosis Systems

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://bluespringsgov.com/ to find contact information for your local officials.

Water Quality in Other Missouri Cities

Missouri Water Quality Page