Many advocates of water quality trading in the United States frequently assume that agricultural nonpoint sources will be the primary trading partner for regulated point sources. Virginia requires regulated point sources to offset new nutrient discharges. Nutrient offsets generated by agricultural nonpoint source reductions are compared against urban nonpoint source and nutrient assimilation offsets. Evidence suggests that agricultural nonpoint source offsets may not be a technically feasible or particularly cost effective compliance option for regulated point sources.
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Stephenson et al. (2010) studied this question.
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