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About Us

About the ETN

The ETN is dedicated to information-sharing. Follow the latest News updates and explore the Water Quality Trading and Environmental Markets pages to find resources on key policy and regulatory issues, technical research, guidance, transferable program design elements, and more. ETN also hosts tracking and reporting information regarding past collaborations and Active Projects.

Goals & Vision

The ETN seeks to disseminate accurate and timely information on water quality trading and other environmental market-based programs, increasing public awareness and supporting successful efforts. In this way, ETN envisions further facilitation and implementation of programs, established through state and federal environmental regulations, with the potential to achieve beneficial outcomes.

Foundation

The ETN originated as the Great Lakes Trading Network in 1996 to support a Water Quality Trading Demonstration Project in the Kalamazoo River Basin of Michigan. With funding from the Great Lakes Protection Fund, it sought to share new information on trading within the broader Great Lakes Basin. As national interest in the subject quickly grew, several other active trading pilot projects in the U.S. desired to be a part of this information exchange. To accommodate this growing interest, the ETN took on its present name and form in 1998.

Since its foundation, the ETN has led and participated in a variety of environmental market-based projects. In the Great Lakes, these projects focus on issues of water quality and water quantity and how markets, market-like mechanisms, and circular economies could be used to help maintain the balance between use and protection of water resources. While the network maintains a principal focus on water quality trading, it has expanded to include information regarding other innovative environmental markets & market-based mechanisms.

Contact

The ETN is maintained through project funding and in-kind support from Kieser & Associates, LLC (K&A). Mark Kieser of K&A has voluntarily served as Acting Chair of the Network since 2000. Contact us for more information.