How hard is the water in Wood County, WV?
9.2 grains per gallon
A softener is worth it here.
The median hardness measured in Wood County, WV is 158 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 9.2 gpg. That is hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 167 samples at 5 sites between 1998 and 2024, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.
How much it varies here
Half the sites came in between 7.2 and 10 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 9.2 gpg a softener is worth getting, mainly to protect the water heater and cut soap use. Get at least two quotes, ask each installer what grain capacity they are fitting, and check it against the sizing table below.
More on sizing a softener for your household.
From 7.0 to 62.8 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Wood County was 119.8 mg/L and the hardest 1,075 mg/L, a 9-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 10 gpg and the bottom quarter below 7.2 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 202 lb of salt a year (6 bags of 40 lb, about $36), 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 $136 a year.
Sizing at 9.2 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 552 | 24,000 | 67 lb |
| 2 | 1,104 | 24,000 | 134 lb |
| 4 | 2,208 | 24,000 | 269 lb |
| 6 | 3,312 | 24,000 | 403 lb |
Wood County against the rest of West Virginia
Among the 54 West Virginia counties with data, Wood County is number 12 of 54 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 48% of counties.
Softest in West Virginia: Calhoun County at 0.3 gpg. Hardest: Jefferson County at 20.4 gpg. Closest to Wood County: Greenbrier County (9.5), Doddridge County (9.6), McDowell County (9.7).