The United States has made significant progress in cleaning its rivers, lakes, and oceans. Investment in wastewater treatment plant technology, conservation practices with land managers, and restoration of natural systems is working in many places. The public supports clean water, yet there is still a long way to go in achieving the vision of fishable, swimmable waters. More than half of the country's streams, lakes, and estuaries are not meeting the water quality standards established under the Clean Water Act to provide clean drinking water, recreation, fish and wildlife habitat, and other designated uses.
The work that lies ahead to achieve clean water will require additional tools and new approaches that can account for watershed dynamics, allow flexibility on how to achieve clear, enforceable goals, and target investment where it can most effectively improve water quality. Water quality trading, under the right conditions, can fit these criteria.
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- OPEN CONTENT LICENSE 2015 This document was developed with an eye toward transparency and easy extension. As such, permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute Building a Water Quality Trading Program: Options and Considerations and its referenced documentation for any purpose and without fee is hereby granted, provided that the notice appear in all copies or modified versions: "Building a Water Quality Trading Program: Options and Considerations" was created in part through the adaptation of publications developed by the National Network on Water Quality Trading (the Network), but is not the responsibility or property of the Network." If any content in this publication is modified or not utilized in its whole, the modified content must carry prominent notices stating that you changed it, the exact nature and content of the changes, and the date of any change. Prior to use of this publication, you must notify Willamette Partnership and World Resources Institute of which content you intend to use, how it has been modified, and how it is intended to be used. National Network on Water Quality Trading; Willamette Partnership; World Resources Institute (WRI)
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