{
  "type": "water",
  "pwsid": "OH3102612",
  "name": "Cincinnati Public Water System",
  "county": "Hamilton",
  "population": 750200,
  "producer": true,
  "source_class": "ohio",
  "label": "Ohio River (Miller Plant, ~88%) plus Great Miami Buried Valley Aquifer wells (~12%)",
  "bodies": [
    "Ohio River"
  ],
  "intakes": [
    "Cincinnati Miller Ohio River",
    "Cincinnati Miller Ohio River S"
  ],
  "wells": 13,
  "aquifer": "Great Miami Buried Valley Aquifer",
  "notes": "Greater Cincinnati Water Works draws from the Ohio River via the Richard Miller Treatment Plant (California, OH) and the Bolton Sutton Plant.",
  "urls": [
    "https://www.cincinnati-oh.gov/water/water-quality-and-treatment/water-quality-reports/"
  ],
  "chain": [
    "OH3102612"
  ],
  "plants": [
    {
      "n": "Richard Miller Treatment Plant",
      "a": "5651 Kellogg Ave, Cincinnati, OH 45230",
      "la": 39.0721,
      "lo": -84.4227,
      "pt": "plant",
      "wb": "Ohio River",
      "src": "Ohio River intake at the plant's riverfront on Kellogg Ave in the California neighborhood, east Cincinnati",
      "cls": "ohio",
      "in": [
        {
          "n": "California (Kellogg Ave) Ohio River intake",
          "wb": "Ohio River",
          "role": "primary",
          "src": "Intake pier on the Kentucky side of the channel; a tunnel over 100 ft under the riverbed feeds the pump station",
          "la": 39.0721,
          "lo": -84.4227,
          "pt": "approximate",
          "sh": 88
        },
        {
          "n": "Reservoir No. 1",
          "wb": "Ohio River (raw water settling basin)",
          "role": "storage",
          "src": "Raw-water reservoir at the California site where pumped river water sits 2-4 days so grit settles out",
          "la": 39.0721,
          "lo": -84.4227,
          "pt": "approximate"
        },
        {
          "n": "Reservoir No. 2",
          "wb": "Ohio River (raw water settling basin)",
          "role": "storage",
          "src": "Second raw-water settling reservoir at the California site, working alongside Reservoir No. 1",
          "la": 39.0721,
          "lo": -84.4227,
          "pt": "approximate"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "n": "Charles M. Bolton Water Treatment Plant",
      "a": "6800 River Rd, Fairfield, OH 45014",
      "la": 39.3379,
      "lo": -84.5769,
      "pt": "approximate",
      "wb": "Great Miami Buried Valley Aquifer",
      "src": "13 wells in the Great Miami Buried Valley Aquifer along the Great Miami River near Fairfield, Butler Co.",
      "cls": "groundwater",
      "in": [
        {
          "n": "Bolton well field",
          "wb": "Great Miami Buried Valley Aquifer (glacial sand-and-gravel outwash filling a buried bedrock valley, recharged by the Great Miami River)",
          "role": "primary",
          "src": "13 wells in Great Miami River gravels near Fairfield; the Bolton plant supplies about 12% of GCWW, mainly northwest Hamilton County (13 wells · Aquifer is ~150-200 ft deep and about 2…)",
          "la": 39.3379,
          "lo": -84.5769,
          "pt": "wellfield",
          "sh": 12,
          "wells": [
            "Well 1",
            "Well 2",
            "Well 3",
            "Well 4",
            "Well 5",
            "Well 6",
            "Well 7",
            "Well 8",
            "Well 9",
            "Well 10",
            "Well 11",
            "Well 12",
            "Well 13"
          ]
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "facts": {
    "hist": [
      [
        "1821",
        "The Front Street Pumping Station begins operating for the private Cincinnati Manufacturing Company, chartered in 1817; it served until Nov. 1907."
      ],
      [
        "1839",
        "On June 25 the City of Cincinnati buys the water works for $300,000, becoming Ohio's first municipally owned water utility."
      ],
      [
        "1907",
        "On Oct. 22 the 'New Works' on Kellogg Ave., begun in 1898 about ten miles upstream, starts continuous rapid-sand filtration."
      ],
      [
        "2009",
        "MSD begins implementing its federal Clean Water Act wet weather program, one of the largest public works efforts in the region's history."
      ],
      [
        "2024",
        "PFOA and PFOS at the Bolton groundwater plant test above EPA's new 4 ppt limits, starting a compliance push ahead of the 2029 deadline."
      ]
    ],
    "treat": "About 88% of supply is Ohio River water treated at the Richard Miller plant by coagulation, flocculation, sedimentation, rapid sand filtration, granular activated carbon, UV light and chlorine, with fluoride. The other 12% is Bolton well water, lime softened and chlorinated, with no GAC.",
    "press": "Not published as a system average. GCWW serves a hilly, multi-elevation area with numerous pressure districts, pump stations and storage tanks.",
    "rate": {
      "g": null,
      "n": "GCWW publishes an annual 'Cost of Your Water' residential rate sheet, but no per-1,000-gallon rate or effective year could be verified from the utility's live pages.",
      "m": null
    },
    "imp": [
      [
        "TTHM",
        "49.6",
        "ppb",
        "80",
        "2024",
        "Range 14.0-60.3. Below MCL, no violation."
      ],
      [
        "HAA5",
        "9.9",
        "ppb",
        "60",
        "2024",
        "Range 2.0-13.2. Far below MCL, helped by GAC treatment."
      ],
      [
        "Lead (90th percentile)",
        "1.12-2.32",
        "ppb",
        "15",
        "2024",
        "Two monitoring periods; well below the action level, though 1 of 107 first-period samples exceeded it."
      ],
      [
        "Copper (90th percentile)",
        "0.019-0.024",
        "ppm",
        "1.3",
        "2024",
        "No sites above the action level in either monitoring period."
      ],
      [
        "PFOA",
        "up to 4.7",
        "ppt",
        "4",
        "2024",
        "Bolton groundwater plant only; above the new EPA MCL. Miller plant stays below."
      ],
      [
        "PFOS",
        "up to 6.1",
        "ppt",
        "4",
        "2024",
        "Bolton plant only; above the new EPA MCL, compliance required by 2029."
      ],
      [
        "Fluoride",
        "0.90",
        "ppm",
        "4",
        "2024",
        "Range 0.72-0.96; added for dental health, well under the MCL."
      ]
    ],
    "proj": [
      [
        "Lick Run Greenway",
        null,
        "2021",
        "completed",
        "Daylighted a buried stream in South Fairmount; eliminates roughly 400 million gal/yr of combined sewer overflow to Mill Creek."
      ],
      [
        "MSD Wet Weather Program (consent decree)",
        null,
        "2009-present",
        "under construction",
        "Has cut annual sewer overflow volume from about 14 billion to 5.9 billion gallons systemwide."
      ]
    ],
    "plan": [
      [
        "Bolton plant PFAS treatment",
        null,
        "",
        "planned",
        "GCWW has grant money to study treatment options and says it will install whatever is needed to meet the 2029 PFAS standards."
      ]
    ],
    "stress": "The Ohio River source is high-volume and drought-resilient, and the Miller plant's GAC gives it a strong barrier against spills and PFAS. The live concern is the Bolton groundwater plant, where PFOA and PFOS exceed the new federal limits for roughly 12% of GCWW customers ahead of the 2029 deadline.",
    "sew": {
      "s": "The Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati (MSD), a county-city partnership, provides sanitary sewers and wastewater treatment. MSD works under a federal Clean Water Act consent decree and has been implementing its wet weather program since 2009 to cut combined sewer overflows into Mill Creek and other waterways.",
      "st": "Much of the older urban core uses combined sanitary/storm sewers. MSD's wet weather plan mixes green infrastructure like the Lick Run Greenway with conventional separation and storage to reduce overflow-driven flooding."
    },
    "fun": [
      "The Richard Miller plant is one of only a few in the country that pairs granular activated carbon with ultraviolet disinfection, and the GAC is regenerated on site in the plant's own reactivation furnace.",
      "Cincinnati's 1839 purchase of a private water company for $300,000 made it Ohio's first municipally owned water system.",
      "Rather than bury the problem in a storage tunnel, MSD dug up a mile of the long-buried Lick Run stream as green infrastructure, cutting about 400 million gallons of overflow a year.",
      "The city's two plants could hardly be more different: Miller filters river water through carbon and UV, while Bolton simply softens well water with lime."
    ]
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  "photo": {
    "url": "/photos/OH3102612.jpg",
    "caption": "Entrance to the River Pumping Station at Cincinnati Water Works' Kellogg Avenue Ohio River intake",
    "credit": "https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/oh0105.photos.127321p",
    "license": "Public domain"
  },
  "url": "https://crackedbuckeye.com/water/OH3102612/",
  "api": "https://crackedbuckeye.com/api/water/OH3102612.json",
  "generated": "2026-09-16",
  "license": "CC BY 4.0 for the compilation; each source keeps its own terms",
  "cite": "Cracked Buckeye (Open Shower Co), \"Cincinnati Public Water System · OH3102612\", https://crackedbuckeye.com/water/OH3102612/, built 2026-09-16, accessed [date].",
  "schema": "https://crackedbuckeye.com/api/schema.json"
}