Methuen Water Hardness & Quality Report (2026)

Methuen, Massachusetts, in Essex County on the Merrimack River at the New Hampshire border — a major Essex County industrial city historically part of the Merrimack Valley textile manufacturing corridor (Methuen Mills, American Woolen Company), now a growing north Shore Massachusetts suburban community with a significant Dominican-American and Latino community — draws its municipal water supply from the Merrimack River via the City of Methuen Utilities Water Division and the Haverhill Water Works system. Water hardness in Methuen measures 42.5 mg/L — classified as very soft.

Methuen's very soft supply reflects the Merrimack River's soft New England crystalline watershed. The Merrimack River above Methuen–Lawrence drains: the New Hampshire White Mountains (Jurassic White Mountain Plutonic Series granite — the Concord, Conway, and Osceola Granites of the White Mountain Magma Series — calcium-poor granitic intrusions); the New Hampshire–Vermont crystalline terrane (Silurian–Devonian Littleton Formation and the Connecticut Valley–Gaspé Trough schist and quartzite — calcium-poor); and the Merrimack Synclinorium calcareous-poor metasedimentary sequence. The White Mountains and New Hampshire crystalline terrain produce the soft Merrimack River water, resulting in the very soft 42.5 mg/L at Methuen.

With hardness at 42.5 mg/L, Methuen residents enjoy very soft water with essentially no scale challenges. City of Methuen Utilities Water Division consistently delivers water meeting all Massachusetts MassDEP and EPA Safe Drinking Water Act requirements.