The video above – starring yours truly – is the first of three video shorts highlighting Big Sky Brewing Company’s efforts to restore its water footprint where it provides the greatest ecological and social gain. For more on this topic, you can visit my previous blog posts, BEF, or the Clark Fork Coalition .

Coincidently, Ecosystem Marketplace just published an article on this very topic: Can Footprinting Stomp out Water Waste? This article recognizes The Coca-Cola Company’s and The Nature Conservancy’s work on a similar water footprinting methodology.

Here are four reasons I’m a fan of water footprinting markets:

1. They measure water use. This is step 1 for all water markets.

2. They are voluntary.

3. They allocate water to its highest valued use.

4. They don’t solve all water problems, but do provide another innovative market-based approach.