West Haven, Connecticut

What is the Water Quality in West Haven, Connecticut?

[Updated: June 9, 2023]

Compared to other US cities, West Haven water quality ranks in the middle range for contamination excluding Lead.

Most of their 24 contaminants have cancer-causing attributes.

• Chloroform is at extremely high levels: 84x health guidelines.
• Haloacetic acids (HAA5) are at extremely high levels: 366x health guidelines.

Let’s look closer at what’s in West Haven water.

What’s in West Haven water?

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

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

These are five of the 24 contaminants analyzed by the Environmental Working Group (ewg.org).

12 of these contaminants are rated as exceeding EWG Health Guidelines.

Does West Haven have Lead contamination?

West Haven may have lead in its water. The most recent Lead samples collected in 2019 from the regional water authority showed concentrations up to 1.0 parts per billion. This water authority services a population of 418,900 people.

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 West Haven’s water come from?

West Haven’s water comes from the Cove River – Frontal Long Island Sound watershed.

6 of 10 water sources in the Cove River – Frontal Long Island Sound watershed are in Impaired or Unknown condition. These include:

• Cove River, West Haven – Long Island Sound
• New Haven Harbor, New Haven – Long Island Sound
• Oyster River, Milford – Long Island Sound
• New Haven Harbor (West), West Haven – Long Island Sound
• Unnamed tributaries to Oyster River

Ideally, a water source would be rated in Good condition. These sections of Long Island Sound are in good condition:

• Bayview, Milford
• New Haven Harbor (Southwest), Milford
• The Gulf, Milford

To summarize, the farther you get from New Haven the better the water quality is.

Learn more from How’s My Waterway

See below for what you can do to improve West Haven’s water.

What Can You Do?

Information about water quality in West Haven can be surprising.

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

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 typically more expensive than pitchers to purchase, but are much more effective.
  • They have the benefit of filtering out heavy hitters like:
    • 1,4-Dioxane
    • Barium
    • Bromide
    • Bromoform
    • Chloroform
    • Chromium (hexavalent)
    • Chromium (total)
    • Fluoride
    • Haloacetic acids (HAA5)
    • Haloacetic acids (HAA9)
    • Nitrate
    • Nitrite
    • Strontium
    • Total trihalomethanes (TTHMs)
  • 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://www.cityofwesthaven.com/ to find contact information for your local officials.

Water Quality in Other Connecticut Cities

Connecticut Water Quality Page