How hard is the water in Phelps County, NE?

15.6 grains per gallon

A softener will pay its way here.

The median hardness measured in Phelps County, NE is 268 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 15.6 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 6 samples at 4 sites between 1994 and 2002, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.

How much it varies here

Half the sites came in between 13.2 and 18.8 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 15.6 gpg a softener pays its way here. Before you buy, check the quoted unit's grain capacity against the sizing table below, and ask whether it regenerates on demand, which uses less salt than a timer. Call your utility for its own report if you are on city water.

More on sizing a softener for your household.

From 9.8 to 24.1 gpg

The softest single sample on record in Phelps County was 167 mg/L and the hardest 412.5 mg/L, a 2-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 18.8 gpg and the bottom quarter below 13.2 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 342 lb of salt a year (9 bags of 40 lb, about $61), 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 $161 a year.

Sizing at 15.6 gpg

Phelps County against the rest of Nebraska

Among the 89 Nebraska counties with data, Phelps County is number 39 of 89 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 71% of counties.

Softest in Nebraska: Blaine County at 2.1 gpg. Hardest: Cedar County at 36.5 gpg. Closest to Phelps County: Furnas County (15.6), Adams County (15.7), Pawnee County (15.4).