While the South Shore deals with low precipitation and record-high temperatures, customers of municipal water systems across the region are now subject to water use restrictions to combat drought.
On June 9, the state’s Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs declared that the Southeast region, which stretches from Quincy to Plymouth, was under a Level 2 “significant drought” restriction. Municipal water systems in that region must ban their customers from using automatic irrigation systems, but Duxbury officials clarified in a June 8 Select Board meeting that customers under Level 2 restrictions can still water lawns with hand-held hoses and fill pools.
“This designation follows two years of below average rainfall, declining stream flow and groundwater access in the state, signaling worsening drug conditions, increasing stress on local water resources,” Scituate Town Administrator James Boudreau said in a June 9 Select Board meeting.
Customers that violate the Level 2 restrictions may receive $50 or $100 fines for each incident. Water from private wells is not subject to the restrictions, but water from wells connected to public water systems is.
The Weir River Water System, which serves Hingham, Hull and North Cohasset, banned all non-essential outdoor water use June 6, citing a Level 3 “critical drought.” Weir River customers will be subject to fines if they water lawns with sprinklers or soaker hoses, fill swimming pools, or wash vehicles and outdoor surfaces.
Towns including Hanover, Duxbury and Cohasset have not updated their websites to communicate the Level 2 restriction to customers since June 8. But all South Shore water systems are subject to at least the Level 2 restriction, and local systems can choose to impose harsher restrictions, as the Weir River Water System did.
Cohasset’s Water Department has only requested “that all customers be prudent with their use of water.” A June 2 release from the Water Department encouraged customers with even-numbered addresses to water lawns only on even-numbered days, and vice versa for customers with odd-numbered addresses, since the town has received only 56% of its typical precipitation level for the past two months.
Mark Cloud, Duxbury’s Water Commissioner, said that the Level 2 irrigation restriction applies only to laws. Customers can use automatic irrigation devices like sprinklers for “growing food, maintaining livestock, plant nurseries, golf course maintenance, venues for weddings, professional washing, watering public parks, watering shade trees, and watering new lawns to stabilize the soil,” he said.
Duxbury had already placed a moratorium on connecting new infrastructure to the water system due to limited water resources in the summer. Cloud said that wells typically run between 18 and 24 hours a day during July and August to keep up with demand.
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