MassDEP, DER, and DCR have been working with Action Research and several Massachusetts communities to develop and pilot water conservation campaigns that reduce summer water use. The Healthy Lawn, Happy Summer campaign uses strategies to change outdoor lawn watering behavior by providing targeted education and feedback to motivate water use behavior change.
Toolkit
The Healthy Lawn, Happy Summer toolkit is freely available from MassDEP and was designed with input from the towns that participated in the pilot projects. The toolkit provides everything communities and water utilities need to implement water conservation campaigns to reduce lawn watering. The toolkit was developed to be user friendly and require little or no external assistance. Find additional information and download the toolkit.
If you are planning to implement toolkit please contact Duane LeVangie at MassDEP (Duane.LeVangie@mass.gov or 617-292-5706).
Foundational Research and Pilot Projects
The Healthy Lawn, Happy Summer program was initiated in 2016 and finalized in 2019. The program had three phases: foundational research on water conservation (2016); program design and pilot testing (2017); and additional pilot testing and refinement (2018 and 2019). Learn more about the research and pilot testing.