Reining in drought : how water limits influence conservation in Massachusetts towns

Abstract

It's surprising to learn that the water-rich state of Massachusetts experiences incidences of water stress, where rivers go dry for stretches of the year and where municipalities struggle to meet water demand. Water conservation and demand management is one important part of reducing pressures on water supplies and alleviating ecosystem stress. Although the state has recently revisited water management policies and has promoted revised measures to increase conservation, the actual measures taken are implemented on the scale of the municipality. This thesis examines three affluent suburban municipalities located in stressed river basins in eastern Massachusetts that have taken different degrees of conservation and demand management efforts. The stories reveal that the decisions to curb water demand have been influenced by the degree to which towns have experienced a perceptible limit to their supply. These towns also show us how a crisis, or an event of water shortage, can bring focus to the limits of water, providing an opportunity for town managers to redefine the problem in such a way that conservation is the solution.

(cont.) As towns continue to face increasing pressure on water supplies, some municipalities would like to turn to regional water. Although these regional systems can help offset some ecological pressures as well as promote economy of scales, it raises questions as to whether such a system would remove the perceptible limit that gives impetus for conservation.