--- title: how natural climate solutions get funded canonical_url: https://ensurance.app/guide/how-natural-climate-solutions-get-funded markdown_url: https://ensurance.app/guide/how-natural-climate-solutions-get-funded.md subtitle: "a payor who already depends on the pathway can hold its condition, per acre, beside the budget they have" category: nature-finance --- # how natural climate solutions get funded *a payor who already depends on the pathway can hold its condition, per acre, beside the budget they have* A forested watershed, peatland, wetland, grassland, coast, or working land can already be doing work for people: filtering water, slowing floods, storing carbon, holding soil, buffering heat, and keeping habitat intact. The funding question is not whether that living system becomes valuable after someone buys something. It already matters. The question is which budget can help keep the pathway working. ## funding map There are three clean doors. - Public budget. A public agency already depends on a watershed, floodplain, forest, wetland, coast, or working land for a public service. The budget can hold the condition of that pathway beside the service it already protects. - Corporate dependency. A company depends on a named supply, site, watershed, coastal buffer, working landscape, or regional climate function. The company can fund the pathway it relies on, per acre, with accounting that explains the dependency. - Carbon receipt. A project issues a measured climate claim under a carbon protocol. That receipt can help pay for work, but it is not the whole reason the work matters. Recent nature-investment writing often treats natural climate solutions largely as carbon-credit and reforestation deals. That is too narrow. Carbon can be measured. It can be issued. It can be retired. But the water filtration, flood buffering, soil health, biodiversity habitat, and climate resilience named in the science sit beside the tonne. They are not inside it. Griscom et al. describe 20 conservation, restoration, and improved land management pathways across global forests, wetlands, grasslands, and agricultural lands. Their maximum potential is 23.8 PgCO2e per year, with a 95% confidence interval of 20.3–37.4, at a 2030 reference year. That maximum is constrained by food security, fiber security, and biodiversity conservation. It is not constrained by cost. About half of that maximum, 11.3 PgCO2e per year, is cost-effective if the social cost of CO2 is at least $100 per MgCO2e by 2030. Natural climate solutions can provide 37% of the cost-effective CO2 mitigation needed through 2030 for a greater than 66% chance of holding warming below 2°C. One-third of that cost-effective slice can be delivered at or below $10 per MgCO2. That is a serious climate stack. It is also a public-service stack and a dependency stack. The main text names pathways such as Avoided Forest Conversion, Reforestation, Natural Forest Management, Improved Plantations, Avoided Woodfuel Harvest, Fire Management, Biochar, Conservation Agriculture, Cropland Nutrient Management, Trees in Croplands, grazing improvements, Coastal Wetland Restoration, and Avoided Coastal Wetland Impacts. The paper's twenty are completed in the supplement. If you need the basic definition first, start with [what natural climate solutions actually are](/guide/what-natural-climate-solutions-actually-are). If you need the payor logic, read [who pays for natural climate solutions](/guide/who-pays-for-natural-climate-solutions). ## the offer The offer is simple: name the living pathway, name the payor's dependency, fund the condition per acre, and report the service in a way the payor can carry. For public payors, the [governments solution](/solutions/governments?from=guide&topic=natural-climate-solutions) connects green infrastructure, public-service accounting, and MRV. For companies, the [corporations solution](/solutions/corporations?from=guide&topic=natural-climate-solutions) connects ecosystem service accounting with the watersheds, forests, coasts, and working lands the business depends on. | buyer | exposure | what we deliver | living work | unit | door | |---|---|---|---|---|---| | NYC Department of Environmental Protection | The city drinks an unfiltered Catskill and Delaware supply. The forest and wetland pathway is already doing that work. | Fund green infrastructure — wetlands, forests, floodplains — that provides public services, and MRV that documents the service. That is the governments solution. | The Catskill and Delaware forest and wetland pathway. | A reportable partnership line per acre of watershed forest, beside the watershed budget the department already runs. | [governments solution](/solutions/governments?from=guide&topic=natural-climate-solutions) and [contact](/contact?from=guide&topic=natural-climate-solutions) | | Salesforce | The downtown San Francisco campus depends on Hetch Hetchy water from the Tuolumne, a forested Sierra supply. | Ecosystem service accounting, and funding the watersheds and forests the business depends on. That is the [corporations solution](/solutions/corporations?from=guide&topic=natural-climate-solutions). | The Sierra supply forest. | A reportable partnership line on that named supply watershed, per acre. | [contact](/contact?from=guide&topic=natural-climate-solutions) | The parent agent [temperate-forests.ensurance](/temperate-forests.ensurance?from=guide) is live. The line is not on the shelf yet: pathway hold under temperate-forests.ensurance can be co-created here: [create pathway hold](/specific/create?mode=suggest&agent=temperate-forests.ensurance&name=pathway%20hold&from=guide). Put plainly: ensurance funds the pathway. It is not the forest. The forest exists whether or not anyone buys a certificate. :::johnson **natural climate solution investment is a hold on the living pathway, per acre, not a second carbon receipt.** ::: ## natural climate solution investment A natural climate solution investment should start with dependency, not inventory. The wrong first question is: what can we buy that looks like nature? The better first question is: which natural pathway already protects our water, flood risk, supply continuity, climate exposure, soil base, or public obligation? From there, the unit can be practical. Per acre of watershed forest. Per acre of wetland. Per acre of riparian corridor. Per acre of coastal buffer. Per acre of working land under a specific management pathway. That unit does not replace a carbon credit. It sits beside it when a carbon receipt is useful, and stands on its own when the service is water, flood buffering, soil, habitat, or resilience. Price is the bridge that lets a budget reach the work. It is not the value of the living system. ### what is a natural climate solution investment? A natural climate solution investment is funding for a conservation, restoration, or improved land management pathway that keeps a living system doing climate work and other service work. It can be attached to a carbon claim where the method, baseline, monitoring, verification, and ownership are fit for that use. It can also be attached to a named dependency, such as a watershed that supplies a city or campus. In that case, the investment is reported as support for the pathway and its service, not as a substitute for every other environmental claim. For a buyer searching for natural climate solution investment, the useful test is whether the line can say what pathway is funded, where it is, why the payor depends on it, how the condition is monitored, and what service is being held. ### who should pay for a natural climate solution? The first payor is often the one already exposed. A water utility can pay because forest and wetland condition affects the water system. A city can pay because floodplains and wetlands reduce public risk. A company can pay because a named watershed, forest, grassland, coast, or working land supports operations or supply. An investor can pay when the instrument has clear service logic, governance, and reporting. Carbon buyers can also pay. That channel matters. It has brought discipline to baselines, monitoring, verification, additionality, leakage, permanence, and retirement. But carbon is one receipt. It is not the only budget that can carry nature-positive work. The cleaner fit is often a blended one: public service budgets for public service, corporate dependency budgets for corporate exposure, and carbon receipts where the carbon claim is real and properly bounded. ### what do you hold if you want the pathway to keep working? You hold a reportable line tied to the pathway's condition. That means the payor can point to a named place, a living system, a management or protection pathway, a unit such as an acre, and a monitoring frame. The report should be plain enough for finance, sustainability, procurement, public affairs, and the operating team that owns the exposure. For NYC Department of Environmental Protection, the logic is not abstract nature sponsorship. It is a watershed forest and wetland pathway beside an existing watershed responsibility. For Salesforce, the logic is not generic tree funding. It is a Sierra supply forest connected to the Hetch Hetchy water the downtown San Francisco campus depends on. The same pattern can work for other payors. Start with the dependency. Name the pathway. Hold the condition. Report the service. Use carbon where it fits. If that is the work you want to structure, use the [contact door](/contact?from=guide&topic=natural-climate-solutions). ## sources - [Natural climate solutions, Griscom et al., PNAS](https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1710465114) — This paper sets the pathway frame and the figures used here. - [The Nature Conservancy: natural climate solutions](https://www.nature.org/en-us/what-we-do/our-insights/perspectives/natural-climate-solutions/) — The Nature Conservancy has helped carry the natural climate solutions frame into public and private climate work. - [Project Drawdown: table of solutions](https://drawdown.org/solutions/table-of-solutions) — Project Drawdown keeps mitigation options visible across land, food, energy, industry, buildings, and transport. - [Verra: verified carbon standard](https://verra.org/programs/verified-carbon-standard/) — Carbon standards show how climate claims can be measured, verified, and retired when a carbon receipt is the right instrument. ## the series - [what natural climate solutions actually are](/guide/what-natural-climate-solutions-actually-are) - [twenty pathways, three verbs](/guide/the-natural-climate-solutions-pathways) - [forests, peat, and mangroves are on the list](/guide/forests-peat-and-mangroves-are-on-the-list) - [the tonne is real and partial](/guide/the-carbon-tonne-is-not-the-climate) - [who pays for natural climate solutions](/guide/who-pays-for-natural-climate-solutions) - [how natural climate solutions get funded](/guide/how-natural-climate-solutions-get-funded)