NORTH MANKATO — When those living in North Mankato turn on their faucets, they can be assured their drinking water is safe.
“We’re very happy with the report,” said Water Supt. Duane Rader of the city’s annual drinking water report. “We have no violations. No alarming numbers.”
The report, which covers all of 2023, was mailed to residents and is available to see at: tinyurl.com/fznhdfvn
In recent years three water topics have been high in public interest: nitrates, lead and PFAS.
Rader said the city has no worries about any of the three.
Nitrates have been a growing concern, mostly in rural wells around the state, particularly in southeastern Minnesota. An estimated 70% of nitrates get into wells from fertilizers applied to cropland, with the rest coming from manure runoff from farm feedlots and urban runoff of fertilizers.
The federal limit for nitrates is 10.4 parts per billion. North Mankato’s highest average or highest test for nitrates was 1.2 ppb. (About one drop of water in a swimming pool is equivalent to 1 part per billion.)
PFAS, called the forever chemicals because they don’t go away in the environment, are synthetic chemicals that have been widely used since the 1950s for everything from fire retardants to food packaging.
“Our PFAS were tested by the state and it was very low,” Rader said.
As for lead, he said there are fewer issues in the city than he anticipated.
Lead in drinking water comes not from the water coming into homes but from deteriorating lead pipes in homes. Michigan cities Detroit and Flint have long been in the news for having many homes with lead pipes, with contaminated water causing a variety of serious health problems, especially in children. The cities, with help of federal and state aid, have been working over the years to replace the pipes.
Rader said that lead piping wasn’t used after 1986, which means much of upper North Mankato has no lead pipes.
“We’re seeing some in lower North Mankato, but not as much as I thought,” he said.
The state Department of Health is requiring cities to inventory what types of pipes all their users have: lead, copper, cast iron or copper.
That report is due in October. After that, the state will work on a program where cities and residents can begin replacing lead with other types of pipes.
Rader said the city has been going through records, based on city records or records filed when homes have been sold and were inspected, to determine how much lead is in the city.
So far they’ve found only about 350 homes that have or are suspected to have lead pipes.
He said there are a handful of homes with no information and the city has Bolton & Menk contacting those homeowners to try to determine what kind of pipes they have.
Homeowners are responsible for paying for all pipes from the main line in the street into their homes. Rader said they are waiting to see what kind of grants will be available from the state to help homeowners pay for swapping out their lead pipes.
The city has two water plants, one near City Hall and one in upper North Mankato near Caswell Park. Three wells feed the upper plant and two wells feed the lower plant.
“A nice thing is the upper system can feed the lower system and the lower system can feed the upper system, if need be,” Rader said.