How hard is the water in Pope County, IL?

4.3 grains per gallon

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

The median hardness measured in Pope County, IL is 73 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 4.3 gpg. That is moderately hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 106 samples at 8 sites between 1990 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 2.7 and 5.9 gpg. That spread crosses a decision line, so some homes here land on a different answer. A $10 test strip on your own tap settles it. Confidence in the county figure: medium (how it is measured).

What to do next

At 4.3 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. Because Pope County straddles a decision line, check your own tap with a $10 test strip before you spend anything.

More on when a softener is not worth it.

From 2.5 to 6.2 gpg

The softest single sample on record in Pope County was 42.5 mg/L and the hardest 105.5 mg/L, a 2-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 5.9 gpg and the bottom quarter below 2.7 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 93 lb of salt a year (3 bags of 40 lb, about $17), 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 $117 a year.

Sizing at 4.3 gpg

Pope County against the rest of Illinois

Among the 102 Illinois counties with data, Pope County is the softest. Across the whole country it is harder than 27% of counties.

Hardest: Cook County at 34.8 gpg. Closest to Pope County: Johnson County (6.2), Jasper County (7.4), Pulaski County (7.8).