Is Metairie water hard?
Updated August 2026 · From the Jefferson Parish water quality reports
Short answer: yes. East Jefferson Waterworks serves Metairie and Kenner with treated Mississippi River water. Its 2025 report lists hardness at 78 milligrams per liter, about 4.6 grains per gallon. That is enough mineral to form scale, so a softener belongs in the recommendation.
The number, and why it moves
Hardness is dissolved calcium and magnesium. The 78 mg/L figure converts to about 4.6 grains per gallon. The Northshore systems in our service area are generally far softer because they draw from the Southern Hills aquifer instead of the Mississippi River.
What that means at your house
At 78 milligrams per liter, a family using around 300 gallons a day runs roughly 71 pounds of hardness minerals through the house in a year. Those minerals can become scale on heater elements, fixtures, and water-using appliances. Most Northshore systems run only a few pounds through the house, which is why the equipment changes when you cross the lake.
So does a softener go in?
Yes. For Metairie and Kenner, our standard recommendation is a dedicated softener for the hardness and a separate catalytic-carbon tank for the chloramine and disinfection byproducts. The two tanks do different jobs.
The rest of what the report says
Hardness is only half the story. The system reports chloramine averaging 1.9 parts per million. That sits near the top of the typical 0.5 to 2 ppm drinking-water range. Individual TTHM samples reached 125 parts per billion against an 80 ppb federal limit, and HAA5 samples reached 82.7 against a 60 ppb limit. The running annual averages that determine compliance stayed below those limits. Whole-home catalytic carbon reduces chloramine and certain disinfection byproducts.
Kenner, same answer
Kenner has no water plant of its own. East Jefferson Waterworks serves it from the same treatment complex, so everything on this page applies there too.