Oyster Restoration under the 2014 Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement: Three Takeaways for Success in Environmental Betterment Efforts

Abstract

For decades, the Chesapeake Bay has suffered from a multitude of environmental issues, including the dramatically reduced population of its native eastern oyster (Crassostrea virginica). Primarily due to the proposed environmental and economic benefits a restored bay oyster population could provide to the region; there have been multiple federally-led oyster restoration projects in the bay since the 1980s. The most recent large-scale federally-led project, the oyster outcome of the 2014 Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement, set a goal of restoring ten tributaries’ oyster population, five in Maryland and five in Virginia. As of 2025, the Ten Tributary Project is on track to meet its criteria for restoration success in these tributaries while performing oyster restoration at an unprecedented scale for both the U.S. and the broader globe. This thesis asks how and why the 2014 oyster outcome has met its oyster restoration goals while preceding agreements under the CBP could not. After interviewing restoration officials affiliated and/or contributing to the 2014 oyster outcome, I argue three components as key to the project’s success among other less successful outcomes in the 2014 Agreement: pragmatism in the planning stage, continuous coordination throughout implementation, and meeting challenges during both planning and implementation. As other environmental projects in the bay produce mixed results, projects which meet their goals for success need to be examined and potentially learned from. Incorporating pragmatism, cooperation, and issue management, as demonstrated in the 2014 oyster outcome, into future oyster restoration projects and broader environmental efforts in the Chesapeake Bay could offer increased potential to meet environmental goals.