UMass Dartmouth was awarded a $10,000 grant to study the social and economic impacts of “nature-based” approaches to coastal flood protection.

The money, which comes from the Boston-based Stone Living Laboratory, will be used by School for Marine Science & Technology Professor Robert Griffin to examine whether social media and cell phone data can be used to understand the demographics of visitors to the shoreline.

The one-year-long research projects is expected to begin this summer, according to a press release. 

“To have nature-based solutions be considered as a serious part of our portfolio of shoreline flood risk reduction will require it to be measured in the same way as traditional approaches. That means having robust science to quantify protection as well as other co-benefits like recreation that are important to coastal communities,” Griffin said. “This funding will help us build the evidence base for quantifying recreational benefits of different flood risk reduction approaches as well as move us towards a scalable tool that can be used in any project evaluation.”