Septic soil in Esmeralda County, NV, by the numbers

Very limited

78.5% of Esmeralda County, NV's surveyed soil comes back "Very limited" in USDA's own SSURGO data, the county's dominant condition for a septic absorption field. This is the reading that pushes a project toward an engineered system rather than a conventional one, and it covers 78.5% of Esmeralda County's land. Esmeralda County covers 3,581.889 square miles and counts 720 residents.

This is a county figure, not a parcel figure

Esmeralda County's rating is an average across the whole county, not a promise about any one lot inside it. A site-specific perc test, usually $750-$1,850, is what a health department will actually require before permitting a lot in Esmeralda County.

System cost, conventional vs. engineered

Given Esmeralda County's rating, plan for the engineered-system range rather than the conventional one. The engineered-system range, $10,000-$40,000 (mound or aerobic treatment), is the more realistic number to plan around, against $3,000-$8,000 for a conventional system on the rare lot that passes.

Esmeralda County's rank among Nevada counties

Nationally, Esmeralda County, NV is the 2,117-most-constrained of 3,058 rated counties for septic soil. Within Nevada alone it ranks 12 of 16.

Related guides

How this rating is built, and its real limits · Conventional vs. engineered septic systems