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 Vol. 3, No. 3: February 28, 2008
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Madera County is home to 26 species of plants and animals that are endangered, threatened or at risk. The Madera Planning Department is considering establishing a conservation bank to efficiently protect these species while managing urban growth. It can be costly and time-consuming for individuals to protect natural habitat. A bank offers incentives and "streamlines compliance" by directing smaller mitigation actions into a bank.
The Australians are pushing to take an entire landscape approach towards nature conservation. In the effort to see and protect the "big picture", Australians are using many mechanisms. Among them is biobanking, a system akin to habitat mitigation banking in the United States.
Coal-miner Anglo Coal's Isibonelo coal mine has a comprehensive wetland offset project to compensate for significant impact on some hillside-seep wetlands, as well as a flood plain wetland, located within the mining footprint. The Department of Minerals and Energy, the South African National Biodiversity Institute (Sanbi), the Mondi wetlands project, the Mpumalanga Parks Board, specialized wetlands consultants, and Isibonelo formulated an acceptable solution.
The South Florida Water Management District governing board approved the long-disputed Poinciana Parkway toll road. The road will cross sensitive wetlands, including bisecting 1.2 miles of the Reedy Creek Mitigation Bank. The developer, Avatar, has agreed to bridge sensitive wetlands in the Reedy Creek Swamp and protect additional land next to the Disney Wilderness Preserve.
Public opposition to BioBanking continues to be vociferous. This short community piece highlights the concern that local government councils will not be able to assess the impact of a development on threatened species. Ku-ring-Gai councilor Laura Bennett said: "You will not have control over which sites are redeveloped or saved."
One Horse Slough is a 135-acre wetland mitigation bank that opened about a year ago near the South Santiam River east of Lebanon. It's one of two such banks developed so far by Oregon Wetlands Inc., a local venture owned by a wildlife biologist, a grass seed farmer and a construction contractor. This seemingly fragile alliance makes a lot of sense in Oregon's mitigation banking industry, a homegrown business sector that has found success by using construction techniques to convert farmland into nature preserves, aka mitigation banks.
"Resident and Valley Watch secretary Sahnti Tyas Tunggal is urging Clarence Valley residents to act quickly and make a submission to the New South Wales Government on its proposed Biobanking scheme... Ms Tyas Tunggal and the Valley Watch group are concerned the scheme would give more power to the NSW Minister for Planning, Frank Sartor, and make way for more development."
– Read story in The Daily Examiner (New South Wales, Australia)
"Reston will embark on a watershed restoration project intended to repair 14 miles of severely eroded streams... The project's first phase will cost $65 million to $70 million, officials said. But Reston residents won't have to pay it. The work will be completed by a private company that specializes in restoring damaged stream systems and funded through a federally coordinated program known as a 'stream mitigation bank.'"
– Read story in the Washington Post (Washington, DC)
The conservation organization River Partners is working to turn Bidwell Ranch into a 759-acre mitigation bank for the city of Chico. While hoping to give the public access to the property they are finding that state and federal agencies involved in the approval process of a conservation bank are not always agreeable to public access of environmentally protected land.
– Read story in the Chico Enterprise Record (Chico, California)
Sabah's new biodiversity credit bank may the first of its kind in the world, but it builds on more than a decade of creating ecosystem service credits. First, the Innoprise-Face Foundation Rainforest Rehabilitation Project (Infapro), was established in 1992 to rehabilitate 25,000 hectares of degraded forests. So far, more than 11,000ha of forests had been rehabilitated and CO2 credits generated. Another carbon sequestration initiative is a 1,000ha Reduced Impact Logging (RIL) project sponsored by US-based UtiliTree Carbon Company. UtilitTree estimates that the project had helped to absorb 147,000 tons of carbon dioxide by 2000, and that projected sequestration was 379,000 tons in a 40-year period.
Yuba Sutter Disposal, Inc., the Ostrom Road Landfill and Wildlands, Inc. have joined together to preserve and enhance over 200 acres adjacent to the Ostrom Road Landfill in southern Yuba County. The 200 acres, known as the Best Slough Mitigation Bank, will be the first vernal pool restoration/creation bank in Yuba County.
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