Facilitating forest-based offsets in water quality trading

This project proposes to harmonize state and local agency forest mitigation and trading requirements to ease adoption by agricultural producers, aggregators and credit buyers like developers. The project will test and refine market infrastructure, so it is immediately useful for landowners, public programs and credit buyers. It will also complete 8-10 forest-based practice pilot projects with Environmental Quality Incentives Program-eligible producers in southern Maryland to test forest protocols and market infrastructure. The project will also assist local governments in meeting the nutrient and sediment goals in their Watershed Implementation Plans by simplifying the implementation of forest based offsets and credits and easing their workload by establishing the Chesapeake Forests Offset Bank.