Auburn's lake water is very soft at 17 mg/L, so the glass problems here are the New England spring pollen wave and snow and ice damage in winter.
Auburn has drawn on Lake Auburn alongside Lewiston since 1875, and the water is clean enough that neither city filters it and soft enough, at 17 mg/L, to leave nothing behind on glass. The city splits cleanly for pricing: mill-district frontage is priced on access, lakefront houses on glass area and the finish their owners expect. June, August and September are the months to book, and a single-story exterior runs $200 to $350.
Seventeen milligrams per litre, published by the Auburn Water & Sewerage Districts and stated by them in both units: one grain per gallon. That is soft by any scale in use, and the district adds that you do not need to soften it. For glass it means mineral spotting is essentially not the local problem — a pane that dries badly here dried badly because of how it was washed, not because of what was in the water.
| Hardness | 17 mg/L as CaCO₃ Soft, as published by Auburn Water District. |
|---|---|
| Iron | 0.012 mg/L |
| Manganese | 0.0019 mg/L |
| Sodium | 16.5 mg/L |
| Chloride | 16 mg/L |
| Disinfectant | chloramine |
| Source and treatment | Lake Auburn, fed by a mostly forested watershed across Buckfield, Turner, Hebron, Minot and East Auburn, and protected by the Lake Auburn Watershed Protection Commission formed jointly by the two utilities · UNFILTERED, which is rare: the EPA has exempted both the Auburn Water District and the Lewiston Water Division from the requirement to filter before disinfection, on the strength of the lake's quality. Water enters through an intake pipe, passes a coarse screen and drum strainer, then ultraviolet light treatment to inactivate viruses. Chlorine is added for disinfection, alkalinity is increased, pH is adjusted, fluoride is added, a corrosion inhibitor is dosed, and the chlorine is then converted to chloramines with ammonia sulfate for the distribution residual. · No softening step. |
Not in the report: pH, alkalinity, corrosion index and total dissolved solids.
SOURCE · Auburn Water & Sewerage Districts, 2023 Consumer Confidence Report, 'Secondary Contaminants (Aesthetic Standards)' table and the Description of Water Treatment Process (awsd.org). Lake Auburn has been the source of Lewiston and Auburn's public drinking water since 1875 and the report covers both. Auburn is the publishing utility's home system. · How we source these numbers
Auburn's cycle follows the lake — the autumn turnover puts organic load into the supply at the same time the leaf drop lands on the glass.
MAINE SEASON BY SEASON →Auburn shares one lake with Lewiston and has done since 1875, and that lake is clean enough that the EPA has excused both cities from filtering it at all. The catch is that the waiver depends on the watershed staying undeveloped, which is now the subject of a lawsuit between the two cities — and if it is ever lost, both cities pay for a filtration plant.
Lake Auburn has been the public supply for both Auburn and Lewiston since 1875, fed by a mostly forested watershed reaching into Buckfield, Turner, Hebron, Minot and East Auburn. The Auburn Water District owns the water rights and the dams at North Auburn and East Auburn.
There is no filtration plant. The EPA has exempted the Auburn Water District and the Lewiston Water Division from filtering on the strength of the lake's quality, so treatment is coarse mesh screening, ultraviolet light, chlorine, sodium hydroxide for pH, orthophosphate for corrosion control and fluoride — and nothing else.
That waiver is conditional and contested. Turbidity above 5 NTU would breach it, and a 2018 algae bloom pushed the reading from 0.6 to 3.1 in a single season, prompting an algaecide treatment and then an aluminium sulfate dose the following year to strip phosphorus.
The dispute is now legal rather than hypothetical: Lewiston has sued the Auburn Water District over Auburn's move to exclude 148 acres from the watershed boundary and loosen septic standards, on the grounds that the waiver — and both cities' rates — are at stake.
Because the water is not filtered, seasonal lake behaviour reaches the tap directly. The lake's annual autumn turnover produces taste and odour complaints most years, and that is the same organic load a cleaner is rinsing off glass in that period.
Both districts sample the lake weekly from ice-out, with a Bates College buoy reporting live through the open-water season — a level of source monitoring that means supply changes here are announced rather than discovered.
Auburn is a mill city on the Androscoggin, and the older stock reflects it: pre-1900 brick commercial and dense worker housing with original sash, painted-in glazing lines and no setback to stage from.
The Lake Auburn shore is the opposite end of the market — large-lot residential with big water-facing glazing, high finish expectations, and the political sensitivity of sitting inside a drinking-water watershed that is under active legal scrutiny.
Auburn splits cleanly on stock: mill-district frontage priced on access, lakefront housing priced on glass area and finish standard.
Mill-era sash with painted-in glazing lines and lakefront elevations with high finish expectations are both slow, careful work rather than a weekend job.
OPEN COST ESTIMATOR →2025 annual mean at the Country Kitchen Bakery Parking LOT monitor, Lewiston Country Kitchen Bakery Lot & Canal ST, 2.9 km east of the city (EPA site 23-001-0011).
Largest air release: Pioneer Plastics Corp, 1 Pionite RD (plastics and rubber), inside the city limits, 24,921 lb in 2024.
Except as the ordinance allows or exempts, no one in Auburn may create, start or keep up a non-stormwater discharge to the storm drainage system.
Auburn Code §18-125: prohibition of non-stormwater discharges · checked September 2026
Auburn's zoning chapter treats historic and archaeological resources only as a site-plan standard for projects that already need planning board review, asking that designs protect them; there is no local historic district or certificate requirement for changing windows on an existing building.
Auburn Code Sec. 60-1094: historic and archaeological resources, purpose · Auburn Code Sec. 60-1096: standards of approval · checked September 2026
Late-winter and early-spring ice-melt residue carries chloride-residue, mineral residue, and organic residue composite. Ice-dam meltwater residue from roof-edge ice damming produces a distinctive composite residue on upper-pane and sash-perimeter glass. Percarbonate-citric ladder protocol required on the worst-affected stock.
Auburn runs on Auburn Water District a mixed surface-and-groundwater blend at a published 17 mg/L (CaCO₃) — soft. Seventeen milligrams per litre, published by the Auburn Water & Sewerage Districts and stated by them in both units: one grain per gallon. That is soft by any scale in use, and the district adds that you do not need to soften it.
Residential window cleaning in Auburn typically runs $7–11 per pane or $200–350 for a standard single-story exterior. Auburn splits cleanly on stock: mill-district frontage priced on access, lakefront housing priced on glass area and finish standard.
Auburn's drier, frost-free months are June and August and September, by NOAA's 1991–2020 normals for the Lewiston station. The calendar on this page marks June (after the May 20 bloom and after smoke season). Frost nights usually run from October 19 to April 25.
Usually yes: Auburn Water District publishes hardness of 17 mg/L, low enough that tap-rinsed glass tends to dry clean. Treatment starts with uNFILTERED, which is rare: the EPA has exempted both the Auburn Water District, the Lewiston Water Division from the requirement to filter before disinfection and on the strength of the lake's quality. Water enters through an intake pipe.
In Auburn the dominant residue patterns include new england pollen wave and snow and ice damage. Auburn's cycle follows the lake — the autumn turnover puts organic load into the supply at the same time the leaf drop lands on the glass.
Mill-era sash with painted-in glazing lines and lakefront elevations with high finish expectations are both slow, careful work rather than a weekend job.
Just over the Maine line