Having Your Water Tested

If your well is installed into bedrock (not a shallow cement-pipe bored well) and you are concerned about your drinking water, sampling the well for analysis of uranium would be appropriate if you live in one of the following counties – Anderson, Oconee, Greenville, Pickens, Cherokee, Spartanburg, Union, Chester, Lancaster, York, Abbeville, Edgefield, Greenwood, Laurens, McCormick, Saluda, Fairfield, Newberry, Lexington (north of Lake Murray), Northwest Richland, Northwest Kershaw, or Northwest Chesterfield.

For most wells in the Lower Coastal Plain (installed in sands, silts, or clays), there is no data to suggest that uranium or other radionuclides would be present and sampling the well is far less likely to reveal a problem. However, some areas of the Inner Coastal Plain near the Fall Line have scattered occurrences of radium. This is completely unrelated to the conditions in the upstate. If you use a private well for your home and live in Aiken, Calhoun, Chesterfield, Darlington, Dillon, Southern Edgefield, Florence, Kershaw, Lee, Lexington, Marlboro, Orangeburg, Richland, or Sumter, sampling the well for analysis of radium may be appropriate if you are concerned about your drinking water. Because of limited resources, the Department simply cannot afford to test everyone’s well in the state. Other than the Department’s radiological laboratory, there is only one lab in South Carolina that is currently certified to test for radiological parameters in drinking water – General Engineering Laboratories (GEL), located in Charleston, South Carolina.

Uranium

GEL provides uranium testing of private wells for homeowners at a very reasonable cost of $25 per sample. If you want to have your water tested for uranium and are willing to pay the $36 fee to GEL, you can pick up and return sample containers at any EQC Regional Office. The locations of the Regional Offices are listed below as well as the counties they serve. When you return the sample container to the EQC Regional Office, you must have a check or money order made out to GEL in order for the Department to accept the sample. The Regional Office will ship your sample to GEL with others from the area along with the payment for the analyses. You can expect to receive the results of your test in the mail approximately 3-4 weeks after you bring the sample in for testing. For more information, contact your local EQC Regional office.

Radium-226 and Radium-228

Testing options for Radium-226and Radium-228 include the SCDHEC Radiological Laboratory and General Engineering Laboratory.

For the SCDHEC Radiological Laboratory the cost is $50 per sample. You must contact your local EQC Regional office in order to be put on a waiting list. There is limited capacity for the SCDHEC laboratory and the turn-around time for analytical results is 6-8 weeks at a minimum.

For General Engineering Laboratory the cost is $198 per sample. You should go through your local EQC Regional office to get sample bottles for this analysis. The turn-around time is 4-5 weeks at a minimum.

Radon

Radon in drinking water is the most complicated sample of the four listed to sample correctly. It is important to minimize air space in the sample bottles. In addition, the samples must be kept cool from the time they are collected until they are received by the laboratory. Radon in water samples also have a short holding time so they must be shipped to the lab immediately. The GEL charge for radon is $67.50 and requires special sample containers. If you want to test your drinking water for radon and are willing to pay GEL, please contact your local EQC Regional office to make sure that the sample containers are available.

Note: In order to get the samples to GEL within the required time frames, no radon samples will be accepted on Fridays! All other samples can be delivered on Friday but will be held until Monday or Tuesday for shipping.

Bureau of Water . Phone: (803) 898-4300 . Fax: (803) 898-4215 . Contact Us