Water Quality & Forever Chemicals
If "Ann Arbor drinking water" brought you here, relax, no alarm bells. What follows is a plain-language roundup of what public federal water records show for Ann Arbor, Michigan, gathered so you needn't comb through the raw datasets. The thing to hold onto: the water at your faucet is shaped by the specific utility and source tied to your address, which is why a single city-wide answer only gets you partway.
1
PFAS detections in nearby water systems
EPA UCMR 5 (2021–2024) results matching the city name
0
Industrial PFAS facilities in city
EPA TRI 2024 reporting
7
DoD PFAS installations statewide
In Michigan
Much of the Ann Arbor area is served by a blend that tends to draw on the Huron River as a surface source alongside groundwater wells, a mix that's fairly well documented for the city. Other communities lean differently. Because your street's supply depends on the system serving it, the regional picture here is useful background rather than a guarantee about what flows from your own tap.
Around Ann Arbor, neighbors a short walk apart can be on different public water systems, so the regional view above may not describe your tap at all. The reliable way to know is to find the system listed for your address and read its annual Consumer Confidence Report, published free by every utility. One call to the utility named in the live list clears up the rest. It's genuinely worth reviewing when evaluating an address.
"Ann Arbor water hardness" is a frequent search, and it usually traces back to spotty dishes or a crusty kettle, not to health. Groundwater across much of southeast Michigan tends to run hard, but blends vary and we won't assign your tap a number. The practical route: a cheap test strip, or a peek at your utility's annual report, which often lists hardness. Mystery of the chalky shower head: solved.
EPA required public water systems serving 3,300+ people to test 29 PFAS compounds between 2021 and 2024.
City-level numbers describe the broad pattern around Ann Arbor; two homes a mile apart can sit on different water systems with very different profiles. The address report fills that gap — it identifies the public water system serving a specific property, lists any PFAS detections on that exact system, and maps the nearby industrial and Superfund sources.
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EPA data tells you what your utility reported on the days they tested. A Tap Score kit tells you what's coming out of your faucet, right now. Mail-in lab, certified results in about a week. The same labs cities use.
Order a Tap Score kit →Guide
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We won't give you a safety verdict, and a careful reader should distrust any page that does. This page instead summarizes what federal records such as UCMR 5 show for Ann Arbor. Note that detection differs from exceedance, and UCMR 5 mostly covers larger systems, so a quiet result means "no records here," not certified safe. Only the system serving your exact address can answer for your tap.
Look at the system or systems listed on this page, then track down that utility's published contact details and its annual Consumer Confidence Report. Since adjacent addresses can sit on different public water systems, the surest approach is matching your specific address to its provider rather than assuming the city's main utility covers your home.
Broadly, much of the Ann Arbor area tends to rely on a blend of the Huron River as a surface source and groundwater wells, which is reasonably well established for the city. Your actual source depends on the system serving your address, and that utility's annual report will lay it out plainly with no guesswork.
We can't give an address-level hardness figure for Ann Arbor, because no such dataset exists to cite honestly. Groundwater across much of southeast Michigan tends to run hard, but treated water varies. To learn yours, use an inexpensive test strip or check whether your utility's annual report lists hardness, as many do. It's a nuisance topic, not a health concern.
Enter an address — we'll identify the serving water utility, pull PFAS detections, FEMA flood zone, and nearby Superfund sites, then give you a plain-English A–F grade. $19.99 single, $29.99 two-address bundle.
One-time report. PFAS, water violations, Superfund sites, flood zone, air quality, and a plain-English A–F grade for the address.
More Michigan data: Superfund sites · PFAS in Michigan
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