Middlesex County, New Jersey: drinking water report. Middlesex County sits in central New Jersey, home to cities including New Brunswick, Edison, Perth…
Middlesex County sits in central New Jersey, home to cities including New Brunswick, Edison, Perth Amboy, Woodbridge, and Piscataway. The county draws water from a mix of sources: the Raritan River system, Delaware and Raritan Canal, local reservoirs like the Lawrence Brook basin, and groundwater from the Old Bridge aquifer system. More than 800,000 residents rely on a patchwork of municipal utilities, including the Middlesex Water Company serving multiple towns, plus independent systems in larger municipalities.
New Jersey has one of the most aggressive PFAS monitoring programs in the country, and Middlesex County reflects both the state's industrial legacy and its regulatory response. The Raritan River watershed, which supplies much of the county, has documented PFAS contamination from historical manufacturing sites, particularly in communities with aerospace, plastics, and electronics production. State testing has detected PFAS compounds in several municipal systems across the county, though most utilities have responded by blending sources, installing granular activated carbon filtration, or taking contaminated wells offline.
Lead remains a concern in older communities where housing stock predates the 1986 lead solder ban. New Brunswick, Perth Amboy, and sections of Woodbridge contain neighborhoods with homes built in the 1920s through 1950s, creating elevated risk for lead leaching from service lines and household plumbing. The state's revised Lead and Copper Rule requires testing, but results vary widely by building age and water chemistry. Schools in the county have conducted mandatory testing, with some buildings requiring remediation of fixtures and fountains.
Industrial history compounds these challenges. Former manufacturing sites, particularly along the Raritan and in the Route 1 corridor, have left soil and groundwater contamination that can migrate into water supplies. The county includes multiple Superfund sites and known contaminated sites tracked by the state Department of Environmental Protection. Volatile organic compounds, including chlorinated solvents from electronics manufacturing and dry cleaning operations, have appeared in monitoring data for some municipal wells. Utilities typically address this through well closures or treatment systems, but the legacy contamination remains a background concern.
Check your specific address water quality data at KnowYourExposure.com to see current contaminant levels for your ZIP code and water system. Review our water filter guide to find NSF-certified options for PFAS, lead, and VOCs based on what your data shows. Request your detailed water quality report for a complete analysis of all detected contaminants in your area, and visit our New Jersey state page for context on statewide testing requirements and contamination patterns.