Lacey Water Hardness & Quality Report (2026)

Lacey, Washington, in Thurston County at the south end of Puget Sound — a major Olympia metropolitan area east suburb, one of Washington State's fastest-growing cities, home of Saint Martin's University, adjacent to Joint Base Lewis-McChord (JBLM), and a rapidly developing South Sound residential and commercial community — draws its municipal water supply from the Nisqually Alluvial Aquifer and McAllister Springs via the City of Lacey Public Works Water Division. Water hardness in Lacey measures 18.5 mg/L — classified as extremely soft.

Lacey's extremely soft supply reflects the South Puget Sound's calcium-poor glacial outwash geology. The McAllister Springs (the primary Lacey water source — large artesian springs discharging from the Nisqually delta alluvial aquifer) draw from Pleistocene Vashon Stade glacial outwash — predominantly clean quartz and feldspar sand from the Cascade Range and Olympic Mountains (calcareous-poor volcanic and crystalline terrains). The Nisqually River headwaters in Mount Rainier National Park (the Quaternary Mount Rainier basalt–andesite volcanic terrain — extremely calcium-poor) recharge the Nisqually alluvial outwash with very soft snowmelt, producing the extremely soft 18.5 mg/L at Lacey.

With hardness at 18.5 mg/L, Lacey residents enjoy some of the softest water in the United States. City of Lacey Public Works consistently delivers water meeting all Washington DOE and EPA Safe Drinking Water Act requirements.