Solving Climate, Naturally

Walter Moore (President) and Peter Cowan (Director of Conservation Science) @ Peninsula Open Space Trust

In this episode, we speak with Walter Moore and Peter Cowan on the leadership team at the Peninsula Open Space Trust, the engine for conservation of the natural landscapes around and within Silicon Valley. POST is a uniquely successful land trust and has helped conserve over 80,000 acres of land in one of the most biodiverse (and most expensive) regions in the world. 

Walter brings unique perspective to POST’s journey, as an expert in land conservation and law who has served as...

In this episode, we speak with Elizabeth Littlefield, Senior Partner at West Africa Blue, a community-centric blue carbon project developer operating in Sierra Leone and Guinea. Elizabeth brings unique perspective to the conversation from her time as the President and CEO of OPIC, now renamed the US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC), where she served from 2010 until 2017, as well as from her decade as CEO of the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP), a policy and research center housed at the World Bank dedicated to advancing poor people’s access to financial services, and her 16 years at JP Mo...

In this episode, we speak with Aakash Ahamed, a remote sensing scientist developing methods to measure forest carbon using instruments deployed on phones, drones, planes, and satellites. He is the co-founder and CEO of Working Trees, a start-up focused on leveraging mobile phone sensing technology to improve ease, accuracy, and transparency in tree carbon monitoring.  In this episode, Aakash shares Working Trees’ origin story at Stanford, the company’s journey to find product-market fit, plans for scale, and the challenge with measuring trees from space.

In this episode, we touch on:

How forest carbon is measu...

SCN host Julia Strong and field correspondent Morrison Mast report from New York Climate Week 2023, bringing listeners voices from the Brazilian Amazon, London, New York, and more to experience one of the climate community’s biggest weeks and understand the state-of-play of nature-based solutions during this tumultuous time in carbon markets. In this episode, we share our takeaways from climate week by sharing recordings from panels and conversations at Nature4Climate’s Nature Positive Hub throughout the week. Our three main takeaways were:

NY Climate Week should be rebranded to Nature and Climate Week given the plethora of n...

Tim Christophersen leads Salesforce’s nature positive strategy - internally defining Salesforce’s nature-related goals and how to meet them, partnering with other corporations to help them advance action for nature, and driving cross-sector partnerships to unlock nature-based solutions at scale. Tim shares the challenges for nature-based solutions investments and corporate action today, provides his take on the Taskforce for Nature-related Financial Disclosure (TNFD) and other recent regulatory and standards developments, discusses misconceptions in the market today, and gives tips on how to make the business case for nature in the private sector.

In this episode, we also...

In our first episode featuring a corporate sustainability leader focused on nature-based solutions, we interview Megan about her role at Iberostar, her priorities as they relate to nature-based solutions, and the challenges and opportunities driving innovation for both adaptation and mitigation internally and with partners externally. Megan shares her thoughts on what a nature positive, responsible tourism industry looks like, and what she wishes her peers in corporate sustainability knew about nature-based solutions. 

In this episode, we also touch on:  

> Megan’s journey from PhD student at Stanford to leading sustainability at Iberostar

> Ibero...

In this episode, we talk with Clara about Restor, an online platform that hosts more than 100,000 restoration and conservation projects worldwide and connects on-the-ground land stewards of these projects with the financing and information they need to succeed. Clara speaks about what these projects actually look like, the opportunities and limitations of digital monitoring, reporting, and verification (DMRV) technology, and the role of Restor in driving the overall restoration movement forward. 

In this episode, we touch on:  

> Clara’s journey from the cloud forests of Monteverde, Costa Rica to CEO of Restor

> How Resto...

In this episode, we talk with Ariel about her work at Patch scaling carbon removal solutions through innovative finance mechanisms and tech, what’s holding the voluntary carbon market back today, and the ins and outs of soil carbon relative to other nature-based solutions out there. 

In this episode, we touch on:  

> Ariel’s personal journey from her family’s background in farming and ag to her work in business to drive capital to climate solutions

> Patch’s role in the climate tech ecosystem

> The nuances of soil carbon particularly as it relat...

In this episode, we speak with Megan Reilly Cayten. Megan has developed, financed, and managed projects to deliver positive impacts for people and the planet on four continents, and is currently Senior Investment Manager with Climate Asset Management, a new institutional natural capital platform. She has a background in power and infrastructure development, finance, and asset management , and has advised funds, companies and projects on climate and carbon offset strategy and impact. She is a Senior Adviser to the Oceans 2050 Foundation, board member of the largest conservation NGO in Mexico and Environmental Voter Project and is on the National...

In this episode, we speak with Eron Bloomgarden of Emergent, a non-profit designed to channel large flows of private capital into protecting the world’s tropical forests. In 2021 Emergent launched the LEAF Coalition, which works with jurisdictions (countries or large states) on the supply side of REDD+ carbon credits, and large corporates on the buy-side, to provide forward purchase agreements. Donor countries - the US, UK, and Norway - act as buyers of last resort. To date, the LEAF Coalition has raised over $1 billion in funding for forest protection. Eron brings two decades of carbon markets experience to the con...

Doniga is a regenerative rancher, wildlife tracker, author and thought leader around nature and our role within it. She and her husband own and operate Markegard Family Grass-Fed, and lease land encompassing over 11,000 acres across the Bay Area in Northern California. In this episode, we explore the lessons Doniga has learned in her many years of actively managing land and applying regenerative practices and witnessing first hand all the climate, biodiversity and systemic benefits that stem from them.

Topics covered in this episode:

Doniga’s journey from wildlife tracking to regenerative ranching

Co...

In this episode, we speak to Marty about the urgency of the climate crisis and the role that ocean ecosystem restoration and carbon sequestration have to play in solving it. Having grown up around commercial fishing and received formal training as an engineer, Marty is combining his passion for our oceans with his technological know-how to build Running Tide, working to scale our ocean’s ability to sequester carbon, create more resilient shorelines, and provide nutritious food to our changing and ever-more populous planet. Kelp as a natural climate solution is still new, and largely untested and Marty speaks to...

In this episode, we sit down with Dominique Bikaba, Founder and Executive Director of Strong Roots Congo, a grassroots conservation and sustainable development organization operating in the Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) that is securing land tenure for community forests and creating an ecological corridor for the critically endangered eastern lowland gorilla. The corridor preserves primary forest and enhances reforestation of degraded areas, while creating economic opportunity for community members. Born in the area that is now that Kahuzi-Biega National Park, Dominique has dedicated his life to conservation in the region. He holds a master's degree from the...

In this episode, we talk with Duncan about his new venture, Calyx Global, the role of different actors in the voluntary carbon market, how this market is evolving, and the challenges of driving both quality and scale.

In this episode, we touch on:  

- The challenges of ensuring quality in the carbon markets and the state of voluntary carbon markets today

- How Calyx Global assesses quality of carbon credits, using new assessment processes, technology, and data

- The current state of the carbon markets ecosystem and how standards bodies, verifying bo...

In this episode, we talk to Neal about his work transforming degraded landscapes through regenerative agroforestry. From the Al Baydha Project in Makkah, Saudi Arabia, where he lived and worked alongside the bedouin tribesmen to convert deserts into savannahs, to his current work establishing regenerative seawater agroforestry systems in Mexico and beyond, Neal brings a wealth of knowledge as well as a dose of inspiration for the ecological transformation that can be accomplished even in some of the most difficult environments. 

Topics covered in this episode:

- [01:35] Neal’s personal journey into regenerative eco...

In this episode, we talk with Justin about his work bridging worlds in order to unlock the potential that nature has to be a bigger part of the climate story. He discusses the critical importance of putting people at the center of natural climate solutions (NCS) and funneling more resources to farmers, foresters, environmental organizations, and communities that are on the forefront of climate change. He also shares a number of stories to inspire hope and optimism, and the dream that we could be the first generation in 10,000 years to begin to reverse environmental damage.

In this...

In 2017, Bronson Griscom published a landmark study on the impact potential of natural climate solutions, suggesting that a portfolio of conservation, restoration and land management actions can enable at least 30% of required emissions reductions by 2030 to remain on a 2C pathway.  In this episode, we explore how Bronson thought about pursuing these questions, how likely we are to actually get it done, and how we can unlock NCS at scale.

In this episode, we touch on:

- How to fix nature’s ‘branding problem’

- How to think about impact measurement, permanence and leakage...

In this episode, we discuss the importance of tropical forests in climate change mitigation and adaptation, and we take a tour of natural climate solutions over the years. Frances discusses the evolution of global programs to pay developing countries to protect against deforestation, the merits of conservation vs. tree planting, and her recent work around nature-based solutions as offsets in corporate sustainability strategies.

In this episode, we touch on:

- Non-carbon pathways through which forests help moderate the climate, and why “a ton is not a ton, is not a ton” of emissions abatement

...

In this episode, we explore how technology is changing the way we measure, value, and drive natural climate solutions at scale. Max shares the story of SilviaTerra, discusses with us the importance of data in building functioning natural capital markets, and shares how SilviaTerra is using that data to build the Natural Capital Exchange, their forest carbon marketplace.

In this episode, we touch on:

- Translating data to change on the landscape

- Role of markets versus government in resource management

- Key factors in evaluating forest carbon impact

...