Norland Water Is Soft

Why Is Norland Water So Soft?

Norland sits in the City of Kawartha Lakes, and its drinking water comes from the Norland Drinking Water System, which draws from surface water. That’s the whole story in one sentence: this is lake and river water, not groundwater. And surface water, by its nature, tends to be soft.

Here’s the geology part. The Kawartha Lakes region sits on the southern edge of the Canadian Shield, where the bedrock is dominated by ancient, hard, crystalline rocks like granite and gneiss. These rocks are mostly silicates, and they simply don’t dissolve easily in water. Unlike limestone or dolomite, which are carbonate rocks that readily release calcium and magnesium into water, granite and gneiss are stubborn. Rain and snowmelt run off this hard, low-solubility terrain, pick up very little dissolved mineral content, and end up in the lakes and rivers that feed the Norland system. The result is water that measures about 1 GPG (25 ppm), which puts it squarely in the soft category.

You’re not imagining it if the water feels slick or if soap lathers up quickly. That’s soft water doing what soft water does. The detected minerals, calcium and magnesium, are present, but only in trace amounts. The fluoride detected is also a natural trace element, not a hardness contributor. The key point is that this water never spent centuries soaking through mineral-rich rock. It fell as precipitation, ran over the Shield, and sat in a lake for a while. That’s a recipe for soft water, and it’s exactly what Norland gets.

How Norland Compares to Nearby Cities

The comparison game here is straightforward because the whole region shares similar geography. Norland draws from the same kind of surface water that feeds other communities in the City of Kawartha Lakes. If you’re in a neighboring town that also pulls from the Kawartha Lakes chain or the rivers that drain the Shield, you’re drinking water with a similar soft profile. The bedrock doesn’t change much across the region, so the water chemistry doesn’t either.

That said, there can be local variation. Some nearby systems might draw from deeper wells that tap into pockets of carbonate material, which would push hardness up a bit. But for the most part, if you’re comparing Norland to its immediate neighbors, you’re comparing soft water to soft water. The differences, if any, are minor and not worth losing sleep over.

What’s more useful is comparing Norland to the broader provincial and national picture. The USGS puts the national average at about 7.3 GPG, which is classified as hard. Norland’s 1 GPG is dramatically lower. That means households here use noticeably less soap and detergent than the typical North American home. The WQA and Battelle found that soft water can cut laundry detergent use by up to 50% and dish soap by up to 70% compared to hard water. Norland residents are already living on the favorable end of that equation.

The practical difference also shows up in appliances. The DOE notes that just a quarter inch of scale can cut water-heater efficiency by up to 40%. With water this soft, scale buildup is a non-issue. Water heaters last longer, washing machines work harder per load of soap, and you don’t see those white crusty deposits on faucets and showerheads. That’s the whole story. Norland’s soft water is a genuine advantage, and it comes straight from the granite and gneiss of the Canadian Shield.

How does Norland stack up against the rest of Ontario? It's soft at 1 GPG — Woodstock, Guelph, and Ingersoll sit nearby with different numbers. See the full hardest-water ranking for context.

See where Norland sits on the Ontario water hardness map →

Want the broader explainer on what hardness actually is and how it behaves? Read hard water vs. soft water, explained.