Replenishing Nature: making it easier for business to invest in water
The Replenish project, led by The Rivers Trust, uses nature-based solutions for flood management to generate water storage credits through the Volumetric Water Benefits Accounting (VWBA) system.
By implementing interventions like wetlands and floodplain restoration, the project helps businesses meet water stewardship goals by purchasing Replenish credits, while also improving water quality and reducing flood risk. It involves local landowners, farmers, and catchment partnerships, with monitoring and maintenance to ensure long-term environmental benefits.
This project is one of 24 case studies published in 2024, alongside a report evaluating the process, impact and value for money of NEIRF Rounds 1 and 2.
Access full case studyThis project will establish a formulised Water Stewardship metric to make it easier for businesses to invest in water. Replenish; a Volumetric Water Benefit (VWB) accounting tool will be used as a mechanism to attract more businesses to invest in nature-based solutions.
Financial potential: The World Economic Forum estimated the financial impact of water challenges in 2018 at $35.8bn. The Courtauld Commitment’s target states that by 2030, 50% of fresh food is sourced from areas with sustainable water management. Companies adopting a Replenish approach include Coke, Nestle, Microsoft, Amazon & PepsiCo with more committed to trialling it.
Activities:
- Develop existing Rivers Trust Replenish toolbox to include additional VWB’s.
- Create a user-friendly interface to increase accessibility for sellers.
- Create a warehousing facility to aggregate trading opportunities nationally.
- Test in 5 pilot areas.
- Develop full Business Case.
The metric provides a standardised approach to measure activities that drive environmental outcomes: land & aquatic habitat restoration by improving the quality & availability of water at catchment scale.
Capacity: The Courtauld signatories need projects to meet their sustainable water commitments. We are well connected to offer our water stewardship services to both buyers and sellers.
Innovation & learning: Improve current tools & practices, increasing accessibility and lowering the barrier to market entry for buyers and sellers.
Project Aim
Establish a formulised Water Stewardship metric to make it easier for businesses to invest in water.
To reduce the impact of water usage by offsetting water & increasing the proportion of water bodies that have enough water to support environmental standards in both surface and groundwaters.
Project partners
Funding model
There are a growing number of businesses with water stewardship commitments. Investors also want increased reassurance that companies are acting on water related risks associated with a business’s operations, reputation & supply chain.
The Replenish toolbox provides a robust standard for measuring the benefits of NBS through VBW accounting. For each project the total of ML/yr of Replenish will be quantified. Corporates buy these replenish volumes enabling them to meet their water stewardship commitments. Businesses can then report on their mitigation activities in a consistent & meaningful way. Performance-based payments; the performance of the NBS interventions will be evaluated through pre and post monitoring.
Performance payments will give confidence to the buyers that their contractual obligations have been met. Sellers will be responsible for the monitoring & the cost will be built into the buyer’s contract for delivering and maintaining the environmental benefit. We are trialing this with several corporates, including Nestle, Tesco, Coke at the operational & supply chain level. With further development, a pipeline of projects managed through a warehousing facility will provide structure and legitimacy to scale the approach.
Future Investment Potential
Clean & plentiful water:
- Reducing the damaging abstraction of water from rivers and groundwater by corporates.
- Reaching or exceeding objectives for rivers as per River Basin Management Plans and Catchment Plans.
Protection from & mitigation of environmental hazards:
- Bringing the public, private and 3rd sectors together to reduce the risk of harm.
- Ensuring interruptions to water supplies are minimised during prolonged dry weather and drought.
- Boosting the long-term resilience of businesses and supply chains.
Mitigation of & adaptation to climate change:
- Ensuring that business investment decisions consider climate change resilience
Thriving plants & wildlife:
- Restoring terrestrial & freshwater protected sites to favourable condition.
- Creating or restoring wildlife-rich habitat.
- Increasing woodland through water stewardship activities.
Beauty, heritage & engagement:
- Focusing on increasing action to improve the environment.
Using resources from nature more sustainably and efficiently:
- Maximising the value and benefits we get from resources.
- Improving our approach to soil management.
- Ensuring that food is produced sustainably and profitably.
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