As you probably already know, I'm intrigued by mitigation and by capturing value of water resource assets. AKA, turning blue into green. My time at the AWRA conference strengthened my belief that the two (mitigation and water assets) go hand in hand. I saw a number of presentations that detailed great mitigation design and execution. The projects ranged from aquifer recharge, to ASR, to nutrients, to water quantity, etc. The overarching goal of these mitigation projects were similar: provide adequate regulatory means of mitigation. In other words, mitigation is a liability, how can we minimize its impact on our financial performance. I propose a paradigm shift from "mitigation is a liability" to "mitigation is an asset."
Here's the big idea. If you are already required to mitigate and are designing a system to achieve this objective, why not invest some additional capital to not only meet your current needs, but also future mitigation requirements of others (see illustration above). After all, you're having to mitigate, so chances are upcoming impacts in the area will be required to do the same. This action will provide your project with a marketable mitigation asset and increase your bottom-line.
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