How hard is the water in Clay County, KY?

6 grains per gallon

Optional: a softener helps, but plenty of homes skip it.

The median hardness measured in Clay County, KY is 103 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 6 gpg. That is moderately hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 115 samples at 3 sites between 1999 and 2007, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.

How much it varies here

Half the sites came in between 4.2 and 6.1 gpg. The whole middle of that range gives the same answer, so a test of your own tap is unlikely to change it. Confidence in the county figure: medium (how it is measured).

What to do next

At 6 gpg this is your call. Look for white film on glasses and crust on the shower head: if you see little of either, you can live without one. If you do want one, a 24,000-grain unit is enough, so ask for that size rather than a bigger one.

More on when a softener is not worth it.

From 2.4 to 6.2 gpg

The softest single sample on record in Clay County was 40.4 mg/L and the hardest 106.5 mg/L, a 3-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 6.1 gpg and the bottom quarter below 4.2 gpg.

What a softener would cost to run

For a household of 3, a 24,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 131 lb of salt a year (4 bags of 40 lb, about $24), and roughly 2,346 gallons of regeneration water. Installed, most units run $1,000 to $4,500; spread over 15 years with salt, that is about $124 a year.

Sizing at 6 gpg

Clay County against the rest of Kentucky

Among the 104 Kentucky counties with data, Clay County is number 69 of 104 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 35% of counties.

Softest in Kentucky: Letcher County at 0.3 gpg. Hardest: Jefferson County at 32.9 gpg. Closest to Clay County: Knox County (6), Elliott County (6), Monroe County (6).