Make Your Home the Solution to Stormwater Pollution!

A homeowner's guide to healthy habits for clean water

As stormwater flows over driveways, lawns, and sidewalks, it picks up debris, chemicals, dirt, and other pollutants.  Stormwater can flow into a storm sewer system or directly to a lake, stream, river, or wetland.   Anything that enters a storm sewer system is discharged untreated into the waterbodies we use for swimming, fishing, and providing drinking water.  Polluted runoff is the nation's greatest threat to clean water.

By practicing healthy household habits, homeowners can keep common pollutants like pesticides, pet waste, grass clippings, and automotive fluids off the ground and out of stormwater.  Adopt these healthy household habits and help protect lakes, streams, rivers, wetlands, and coastal waters.

Remember to share the habits with your neighbors!

Healthy Household Habits for Clean Water

Vehicle and Garage

  • Use a commercial car wash or wash your car on a lawn or other unpaved surface to minimize the amount of dirty, soapy water flowing into the storm drain and eventually into your local waterbody.
  • Check your car, boat, motorcycle, and other machinery and equipment for leaks and spills.  Make repairs as soon as possible.  Clean up spilled fluids with an absorbent material like kitty litter or sand, and don't rinse the spills into a nearby storm drain.  Remember to properly dispose of the absorbent material.
  • Recycle used oil and other automotive fluids at participating service stations.  Don't dump these chemicals down the storm drain or dispose of them in your trash.

Lawn and Garden

  • Use pesticides and fertilizers sparingly.  When use is necessary, use these chemicals in the recommended amounts.  Avoid application if the forecast calls for rain; otherwise, chemicals will be washed into your loccal stream.
  • Select native plants and grasses that are drought and pest resistant.  Native plants require lesswater, fertilizer, and pesticides.
  • Sweep up yard debris, rather than hosing down areas.  Compost or recycle yard waste when possible.
  • Don't overwater your lawn.  Water during the cool time of the day, and don't let water run off into the storm drain.
  • Cover piles of dirt and mulch being used in landscaping projects to prevent these pollutants from blowing or washing off your yard and into local waterbodies.  Vegetate bare spots in your yard to prevent soil erosion.