EIP is founded, based on the Partners’ vision of a business combining successful ecological restoration with successful economic development.
Our Story
EIP’s history reflects a commitment to environmental restoration and conservation, sustaining a healthy economy, and safeguarding the long-term resilience of our natural systems.
Letter From Our Partners
We founded Ecosystem Investment Partners in 2006 with the vision of aligning economic development and environmental restoration—and challenging the idea that these goals must be at odds. We believe that healthy economic growth can not only coexist with healthy natural systems, but that these traditionally opposing forces can be mutually empowering.
EIP challenges the tired storyline that pits environmental protection against economic development. Instead, we’re building better alternatives every day through large-scale restoration of land and water resources. We use verifiable science, strategic design, and specialized construction to create meaningful compensation for the unavoidable impacts of public and private sector projects.
If conservation and restoration can form the basis for a viable and sustainable business, that business becomes a perpetual motion machine for both development and environmental restoration.
— Nick Dilks, Managing Partner at EIP
This work will only become more critical with time. Over the next 30 years, the U.S. population is expected to increase by roughly 100 million people. These people will need both jobs and an improved natural environment. Economic development is necessary, and it’s not a question of whether or not this growth will impact our ecological systems—it will. We should always avoid and minimize damage wherever possible as we strengthen the economy. But we must also actively offset the remaining impacts of growth and build back measurable health for our nation’s land and water.
Natural systems act just like the systems in our bodies. Rivers function like arteries and veins, wetlands function like kidneys, and forests function like lungs. The scale is different, but both systems are vital.
— Adam Davis, Managing Partner at EIP
We came together from a diverse mix of backgrounds to create EIP; our different perspectives inform the way we operate a successful business that restores natural systems. Our team has deep experience in land conservation, real estate, environmental policy, finance, biology, hydrology, engineering, and construction. We all share a deep appreciation of the value of nature restored, and we remain tirelessly focused on bringing that value to our customers.
Each of us is grateful for the customers, investors, regulators, and collaborators who make our work possible. We’re committed to expanding the range of problems we can help to solve—and customers we can serve—in the coming years.
Sincerely,
Adam Davis, Nick Dilks, Heath Rushing
Learn more about how EIP and the restoration industry create jobs and accelerate economic development:
Growth of EIP’s Restoration Work Over Time
Statistics as of 9/30/20
Major Milestones
Our engagements take place over years, not months. As project leaders, we take ownership of our work and its outcomes. As committed partners, we view each relationship as a long-term investment.
January 2006
June 2007
EIP completes its first acquisition of 1,000 acres within the Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge. There, we established our first mitigation bank, Dover Farm, in 2010.
May 2012
EIP raises its first co-mingled, institutional investment fund, EIP II, LP, at $181 mm. This pool of committed capital allowed us to develop a national portfolio of mitigation banks.
March 2013
EIP assembles the Lake Superior Mitigation Bank in Minnesota, addressing the challenge of restoring extensive wetlands previously drained for farming.
February 2016
EIP raises its second investment fund, EIP III, LP at $303 mm, enabling us to expand our network of mitigation banks and Pay for Performance restoration.
July 2018
EIP acquires thirteen mitigation banks from Delta Land Services in Louisiana and Texas, pioneering a partnership with Delta to operate these banks under EIP’s ownership.
October 2018
EIP wins the Lookout Slough Pay for Performance contract with the California Department of Water Resources, creating a new large-scale approach to ecological restoration of tidal wetlands, for flood protection and endangered species.
November 2018
EIP completes restoration of Lake Superior Mitigation Bank. With 24,000 acres of bog rehabilitated, Superior becomes one of the largest restored wetland banks in the country.
January 2020
EIP completes its third round of institutional capital-raising, EIP IV, at $454 mm, enabling EIP to develop more mitigation banks, Pay for Performance projects, and custom solutions — and to expand into new restoration markets and serve more customers.
September 2020
EIP completes construction of California’s 180-plus acre Riverpark Mitigation Bank. Strategically located at the base of the Perris Reservoir along the San Jacinto River, Riverpark Mitigation Bank contributes to the revival of a unique and highly endangered Southern California ecosystem.
Let’s Work Together
We specialize in solving complex problems. Our mitigation banks, Pay for Performance solutions, and full-delivery custom restoration options are designed to meet a wide range of environmental restoration and conservation challenges.
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