Caldwell County, North Carolina: drinking water report. Caldwell County – Lenoir – serves about 82,000 residents in the western Piedmont foothills.
Caldwell County – Lenoir – serves about 82,000 residents in the western Piedmont foothills. Water comes from Wilson Creek, Mulberry Creek, and other mountain streams feeding into the Catawba River system.
Caldwell County's foothills location provides clean source water from mountain streams. UCMR5 data shows no significant PFAS detections. According to NC DEQ's 2024 data, county systems met federal standards. The county's furniture manufacturing legacy is an economic story more than a water quality one – contamination from former manufacturing sites has primarily affected soils rather than drinking water sources.
Caldwell County's water quality benefits from mountain-fed sources.
Check your water for data. Our water filter guide covers options. Pull your detailed report, and visit our North Carolina page for statewide data.
Drinking water is one exposure route. These federal datasets also cover Caldwell County, NC.
The EPA places Caldwell County, NC in Zone 2 - a moderate-risk category, with a predicted average indoor radon level between 2 and 4 pCi/L. Zone maps predict an area's radon potential from geology and existing indoor readings; they say nothing about a specific house. Testing is the only way to know your own level.
50% of homes in Caldwell County, NC were built before 1980, and 11% before 1950. Residential lead paint was banned in 1978, so housing age is the strongest available proxy for lead-paint exposure. This describes the county's housing stock, not any one home.
Modelled annual fine-particle pollution (PM2.5) in Caldwell County, NC averages 7.1 µg/m³, within the EPA's annual standard of 9 µg/m³. These are CDC modelled county estimates rather than readings from a specific monitor.
How radon zones work · Air quality by county · Lead exposure guide
12 public water systems serving Caldwell County, NC have EPA lead testing on record. The reported lead sample skews toward systems that already flagged a problem, so its exceedance rate is not directly comparable with other areas. 5 water systems serving Caldwell County, NC carry a health-based EPA Safe Drinking Water Act violation.
| Most-cited violation type | Systems affected |
|---|---|
| Lead and Copper Rule Revisions | 3 |
| Interim Enhanced Surface Water Treatment Rule | 1 |
| Total Trihalomethanes (TTHM) | 1 |
| Lead and Copper Rule | 1 |
Source: EPA Lead and Copper Rule 90th-percentile tap sampling and EPA SDWIS Safe Drinking Water Act enforcement records, aggregated from the public water systems serving this county. Figures are counts of water systems, not a test of any individual home or tap.