Your land is important, and what you choose to do with it is a big decision. Each of our conservation projects is different, including mitigation banks. Freshwater Land Trust holds conservation easements on twelve mitigation banks in Alabama, protecting and enhancing over 3,800 acres of land utilizing this method of protection.

What is a mitigation bank?

A mitigation bank is a wetland, stream, or other aquatic resource area that has been restored, established, enhanced, or preserved for the purpose of providing compensation for unavoidable impacts to aquatic resources permitted under Section 404 of the Clean Water Act.  A mitigation bank may be created when a government agency, corporation, nonprofit organization, or other entity undertakes these activities under a formal agreement with a regulatory agency, typically the United States Army Corps of Engineers.

Freshwater Land Trust partners with mitigation bank sponsors to serve as the Conservation Easement Holder on the mitigation bank site. We monitor and enforce the terms of the Conservation Easement to ensure the long-term investment in the ecological enhancements to the site are protected in perpetuity.

Mitigation banks provide credits:

Restoring, establishing, enhancing, or preserving a mitigation bank can be time-consuming and costly, but those activities can have a significant economic and ecological benefit. Specifically, the value of a mitigation bank is defined in “compensatory mitigation credits.” A bank’s instrument identifies the number of credits available for sale by the bank holder and states the use of ecological assessment techniques to certify that those credits provide the required ecological functions.

Are you a landowner interested in conserving your land? We can help.