Holding the line for nature: how to protect nature finance when the market prizes durability

If you have followed carbon markets over the past six or seven years, you will be forgiven for assuming there is an inexorable trend: tech based carbon dioxide removal (CDR) credits with durable, ‘permanent’ storage are on the rise, at the expense of everything else. 

Market wide, interest in durable removals has grown steadily since at least 2020. This year brought new net zero standards from the SBTi and ISO, both of which ratcheted up the expectation that businesses fulfil more of their climate portfolio with durable removal credits over time. But what does this mean for nature? Will a market marching toward durable removal quietly starve forests, wetlands and soils of funding?

Not if we are clever – and only if CSOs make active choices to keep funding nature recovery, including through new channels, rather than losing sight of it while chasing durable CDR.

The scale of the nature finance gap

UNEP’s State of Finance for Nature 2026 report found that investment in nature based solutions (NbS) needs to rise 2.5x to $571 billion a year by 2030, to meet global climate, biodiversity and land restoration goals. Actual flows in 2023 were ~$220 billion, under 39% of what is needed. The same report found that every dollar invested in protecting nature is undermined by the ~$30 which is spent degrading it. 

Carbon markets remain an efficient, if imperfect, channel for nature funding – REDD+, afforestation/reforestation, regenerative agriculture, blue carbon restoration – delivering carbon, biodiversity and community benefits together.

Meanwhile, durable CDR (including biochar, enhanced rock weathering, direct air capture with storage as examples) is gaining market share and is well positioned for the 2030, 2035 and 2040 compliance milestones now approaching. Many companies are already buying these credits, and rightly so – leveraging an Oxford Principles aligned portfolio, or planning ahead for neutralisation at the net zero year, it is appropriate.

And yet, two misconceptions keep pulling the market toward a nature blind spot. First is the idea that durable removal credits are automatically higher quality than avoidance, reduction or nature based credits simply by virtue of being durable – in reality quality varies within every credit type, and there are many trade offs between carbon and biodiversity benefits. Second is the idea that CDR is our ‘only way out’ of climate change – in reality even maximally scaled, CDR can only ever play a small (if necessary) role and can never substitute for urgent, massive, permanent emissions reductions. 

So, our first step to holding the line for nature finance is therefore to appreciate that we are not looking at a binary choice. It is going to have to be both/and rather than either/or.

Nature based carbon credits in the new ISO and SBTi standards

Naturally, businesses turn to the standards setters to tell them what they need to do. And despite the endorsement of long- ived CDR under the new versions of the SBTi and ISO standards, it would be a mistake to think that this is at the exclusion of nature, in either case. 

The SBTi's Corporate Net-Zero Standard V2.0, taking effect from February 2027, still requires removals for neutralising residual emissions at the net zero year, but this is softer than before, allowing for durability matching rather than obligatory 100% durable removals. It also introduces its Ongoing Emissions Responsibility (OER) framework, – voluntary for now – under which removal, reduction and avoidance credits can be reported as a supplementary action to support global net zero efforts.

Draft ISO 14060 Standard for Net Zero Aligned Organisations sets similar terms for ‘counterbalancing’ residual emissions with long lived removals only. It also obliges businesses to allocate finance for climate action based on setting an internal carbon fee (complementing the SBTi’s OER model) and the portfolio for this can include other credit types and mitigation outcomes.

Both standards explicitly frame nature-based and engineered removals as complementary, not substitutes: SBTi says so directly, ISO specifies that a balanced portfolio includes nature-based removals, and the revised Oxford Principles call for protecting and restoring ecosystems ‘in their own right’, not just as emissions compensation.

Prioritising nature investment in wider decision making

Despite what they would wish, most CSOs have a restricted pot of funds to work from whilst implementing climate action across an organisation, and this means that the choice between funding long lived CDR or funding nature projects appears functionally zero sum. 

However, CSOs have more agency than we might think – and there are innovative ways to ensure nature funding stays on the agenda. 

Ensure internal carbon fees are credible – a climate action portfolio built from an internal carbon fee is only as strong as the price behind it. If the fee isn’t high enough, not only will it not be credible, but it will go far enough either – and CSOs may find that if there is limited cash it will be earmarked for durable CDR at the expense of nature projects.

Blend all climate action portfolios – your climate action portfolio should mirror the gradual transition logic of the standards, with nature based removals doing the near term heavy lifting, and durable removals ramping up over time. Blending the portfolio between different kinds of removals (plus avoidance credits and non-credit based projects) will spread risk, minimise costs, and maximise impact outcomes.

Leverage nature projects for achieving social and biodiversity goals – in many cases, nature based projects produce co-benefits that tech based CDR will never replicate. Biodiversity uplift, water security, improving soil health, supporting local livelihoods and so on – track and report these alongside carbon performance so nature investment is judged on the full impact it delivers, not measured against long lived removals on carbon alone.

Use nature investment to solve key business challenges – tap into budget from elsewhere around the business so that nature funding doesn't only sit in sustainability. Anchoring nature funding to a metric the business already tracks – churn rate or engagement for example – gives it a home beyond the sustainability team, and allows nature investment to be a solution to core challenges the business faces.

Invest in nature as a resilience solution – healthy ecosystems reduce physical climate risk – flood protection from wetlands, soil stability from restored forests, heat resilience from urban greening, and so on. Using nature investment as a solution to specific business risks gives it a business case that stands on its own, independent of carbon markets and sustainability standards.

Holding the line for nature

We know that sustainability standards and the carbon markets are converging around tech based durable removals because durability is scientifically necessary in future scenarios that limit warming as much as possible. But as CSOs we must appreciate that that is not an argument against investing in nature – far from it.

And whilst it may seem, with limited budgets and political and economic headwinds, that the options are one or the other, really the imperative to restore nature is so large and so urgent that CSOs must find ways to keep nature restoration prioritised on the board agenda.

I have provided just a few pathways in this article – but CSOs are creative, innovative, and dedicated. There will always be more, novel ways to integrate financing healthy ecosystems into well-functioning businesses, and CSOs are extremely well placed to take the lead.

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