Roanoke County, Virginia: drinking water report. Roanoke County in Virginia's Blue Ridge has about 94,000 residents surrounding the independent City of…
Roanoke County in Virginia's Blue Ridge has about 94,000 residents surrounding the independent City of Roanoke. The Western Virginia Water Authority draws from Carvins Cove Reservoir and the Spring Hollow Reservoir, supplemented by the Roanoke River. The county's mountain setting provides relatively clean source water, but legacy industrial activity in the Roanoke Valley and the region's karst geology introduce specific concerns.
Carvins Cove Reservoir benefits from a forested, largely undeveloped watershed that produces consistently clean raw water. According to the Virginia Department of Health's 2024 drinking water report, the Roanoke County system met all federal standards with comfortable margins for all regulated contaminants.
The Roanoke Regional Airport has documented AFFF use. VDH's 2024 PFAS investigation found PFOS at 10 ppt in monitoring wells near the airport. The former Radford Army Ammunition Plant, 30 miles west, has documented PFAS and perchlorate contamination that may affect the regional groundwater system along the New River valley.
Roanoke County benefits from well-protected mountain reservoir water – a genuine advantage over many communities. The main concerns are localized PFAS near the airport and the karst geology in the valley floor that can transmit surface contamination to wells quickly.
Check your water for data specific to your supply. For most Roanoke County residents on the public system, a carbon filter addresses taste and disinfection byproducts. For well owners near the airport, reverse osmosis adds PFAS protection. Our water filter guide covers both. Get your detailed report for trends, and visit our Virginia page for statewide context.
Drinking water is one exposure route. These federal datasets also cover Roanoke County, VA.
The EPA places Roanoke County, VA in Zone 1 - the EPA's highest-risk category, where the predicted average indoor radon level is above 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.
56% of homes in Roanoke County, VA were built before 1980, and 8% 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 Roanoke County, VA 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
Across 36 public water systems serving Roanoke County, VA with EPA lead testing on record, 4 (11.1%) reported a 90th-percentile lead result above the EPA's 15 ppb action level, and the median is 4.1 ppb. 8 water systems serving Roanoke County, VA carry a health-based EPA Safe Drinking Water Act violation.
| Most-cited violation type | Systems affected |
|---|---|
| Lead and Copper Rule | 5 |
| Stage 1 Disinfectants and Disinfection Byproducts Rule | 2 |
| Total Trihalomethanes (TTHM) | 1 |
| Haloacetic Acids (HAA5) | 1 |
| Ground Water 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.