Nature-based solutions: Creating resilient places and landscapes

In this episode of the Climate Resilience Podcast, host Phil Emonson is joined by Steve Maslen (JBA Consulting) and Rob Gardner (CEO and Co-Founder of Rebalance Earth) for an inspiring conversation about the power and potential of nature-based solutions (NbS).

Together, they explore how working with nature—not against it—can build climate resilience across landscapes, cities, and communities. From the role of healthy soils and peatlands to the innovative use of pension fund capital, the discussion highlights the urgent need to scale NbS and the financial tools that can help us get there. With real-world examples from Manchester to the Yorkshire Dales, this episode explores innovation, finance, and impact, proving that investing in nature is not just good for the planet, but essential for our future.

Thank you for listening to this episode. 

For any comments, questions or insights please contact phil.emonson@jbaconsulting.com.

Visit our website jbaconsulting.com
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Transcript

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SPEAKER_02 0:00

Hello and welcome to the Climate Resilience Podcast brought to you by JBA Consulting. I'm Phil Emerson, and in this podcast series, we unpicked some of the complexities, the challenges, and the opportunities on the topic of climate resilience with some inspirational thought leaders. Today we're going to delve into the world of nature-based solutions and the role they play in helping us to create resilient places and specifically novel ways to invest in them. And my guests to help us explore how we achieve resilience in nature are JBA Director Steve Maslin and Rob Garner, CEO and co-founder of Rebound Surve. Steve, Rob, welcome to the podcast. And let's have some introductions to start with. Steve, over to you.

SPEAKER_00 0:41

Hi Phil. Hi Rob. Steve Maslin. I'm head of sustainability and environment at JBA. I've been in consultancy practice, environmental consultancy practice for over 40 years now. My background originally was a course in agricultural environmental sciences. I later trained as a landscape architect. And I've been working generally within the sort of natural environment, both planning, design, and management for all my career.

SPEAKER_02 1:14

Super. Thanks, Steve. Nice to have you. Nice to have you with us. And Rob, over to you.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Well, Phil, firstly, thanks for having me on your podcast as someone who's started listening to it. Well done to you and JBA. But yeah, so I'm Rob Gardner. I'm the CEO and co-founder of Rebalance Earth. And we're really on a mission to try and use pension fund money to mobilize £10 billion to restore nature and strengthen climate resilience across the British Isles with a particular focus really on landscapes from source to sea. And how can we use the ecosystem services that nature provides to protect our companies, to protect our towns and cities and communities, predominantly from like water-related risks, but it's also about how can we use nature to enhance biodiversity and capture carbon. And hopefully, if we do this, you know, we start to showcase how pension fund money can be used to fund nature as infrastructure to provide resilience and certainly create a UK worth living in. My background before getting into natural capital is really in pensions and finance. So I've I've spent 25 years in investment banking, but predominantly as a sort of pensions consultant and as an asset owner. So the thing that I know really well is how to kind of mobilize this long-term pension fund capital.

SPEAKER_02 2:35

Super. Thanks. And nice to have you with us, Rob. And look, we're going to get into the conversation certainly around the novelty, I think, of what you're doing in terms of finance and investment. And it there's a similarity there as well to the previous episode, uh, a previous episode of the podcast where we looked at the ARC project with uh Jonathan Moxon from Leeds City Council. So there are similarities here to conversations we've had previously on the podcast. Um, but look, to start with, then we need to, I think, look at what are nature-based solutions. They're going to be the foundation of what we're going to be talking about throughout today, and why do we need them? So look, who who wants to take that one first? Steve or or Rob? Who wants to go with that?

SPEAKER_00 3:18

Shall I start with that, Rob? Yeah, go ahead, Steve. Okay. Um okay, uh, I suppose in my mind, sort of uh nature-based solutions are is it's a term that's bandied around a lot recently. And I I think at its simplest, it's a way to solve environmental problems. Um, and it's provided solutions which are actually inspired and supported by nature. And they're based around sort of natural processes, um, and that's the I suppose the distinctive secret of nature-based solutions, that it's it's trying to work with nature and use natural processes uh to provide these uh environmental solutions. Um I mean uh just uh an example just to sort of illustrate the point here that you know healthy soils that you know they they have multiple functions, they they have an ability to absorb water, they they they help prevent um uh erosion by binding the silts and fine and fine sands, and and and above all, they produce crops and food for us. So they have these abilities to help reduce flood risks, produce food, um, and improve water quality. And it's these harnessing these natural processes um is which is the secret in my mind to nature-based solutions.

SPEAKER_01 4:48

I I think Steve's definition is is is is is great. I think if if we take a sort of let's say uh hard-nosed economist view and and take what Steve said, what's really attractive is they are cost effective. So, you know, whether they're you know, for every pound invested, you get six pounds the benefit or ten pounds the benefit. And it goes back to the second point is that they're multifunctional. So, you know, we've just heard how soil gives all of these benefits, but we can talk about spagnant moss, we can talk about oyster reefs. Nature is like four billion-year-old technology that has multiple ecosystem services. And then the exciting thing is is it's scalable, right? And and actually, if we can let nature follow her natural processes, uh, we can start to do this at scale. And I think the reason why your podcast is so important or why this conversation is so important is you know, we have a window of action where we need to move from examples. There have been lots of brilliant little examples potted all over the UK. But I think now we need to bring a much more disciplined mindset in the same way that you know we've rolled out renewables across the UK to say how can we scale up these nature-based solutions to solve multiple and and overlapping and wicked problems that impacts you know our communities, our companies, our cities, our our landscape. So it's probably worth just sort of touching on why now and the sort of problem.

SPEAKER_00 6:20

I think that's uh some interesting points there, Rob. You know, the other key feature of these nature-based solutions is the multiple benefits. Um, and I and I suppose something I've been wrestling with for many years in my career is many of these benefits have never never been, they've been valued in a in a in a quite simplistic sense, but they've never really had any, there hasn't been much investment in it apart from sort of general public investment. And I think what's really interesting about your work now is that we're we're we're at this cusp where we're beginning to understand and begin to uh sort of set out how perhaps markets and and the private uh capital can come into to this area. And I and and and the the point being, Rob, that you made is that we we're not going to be able to scale this up without the levels of investment, um, with well, very, very large levels of investment, and and quite clearly in the in that's not going to come from the public sector. Um now. So it's how do we unlock this um private potential capital to to into these providing these solutions, and I I think that's what's um is really novel about rebalance earth.

SPEAKER_02 7:50

Yeah, I think that's a really good conversation starter there. I think we've covered a a lot a lot of points just in that opening sort of discussion piece. Um I suppose I was struck by what you both said, but in particular, this thing about multiple multiple benefits, and actually what we're talking about here are are um a suite of measures that will provide benefit in terms of flood risk, water quality, drought, biodiversity. That the the the list will go on. But Steve, there's a there's a a an important point, I think, here that we want to address, which is that nature-based solutions, if I'm right in my understanding, isn't an action or a set of actions. That's that that's that's correct, isn't it? What we're talking about here is that is a is a is a it's a it's a suite of processes and and concepts, but it isn't an an action per se.

SPEAKER_00 8:42

Yeah, uh it yeah, you can I don't I don't think it's best defined uh simply as a uh typically in flood risk you might have a uh you know a defensive wall or a defensive mound. I I think there is a suite of uh solutions that have been tried and tested, which are out there, but the fundamental about nature-based solutions is you are you are working with the natural processes. So whilst there is a suite of of measures or actions that you can take, which are you know that there's strong evidence, very strong evidence uh about the efficacy of all these, um that there will be a suite, the suite will get larger because it it is a way of um working with nature. That's the underlying principle with it, rather than just seeing it as a suite of oh, we'll have one of those or one of those and we'll have a bit of that. It's it shouldn't be necessarily in my mind be conceived of that, but there are a lot of there are a lot of actions and measures out there. We know, for example, that um uh uh cross um slope tree planting slows the flow down, it absorbs um and and and and traps sediments that would otherwise get into the watercourses or block drains in the roads. We know riparian woodland does does does the sim similar thing with woodland next to the water course. So the the the evidence is about the efficacy is is is is is good. Um but it but there will be more of them as they come on as people begin to think uh in a more rounded way about working with nature rather um rather than not, as it were.

SPEAKER_02 10:36

Yeah, yeah. Okay, so um Rob, you were just sort of talking there about why now, um which I think is an interesting question. Um, but why now for Rebalance Earth? And so I suppose the question is for for you as we move into this next part of the conversation, I suppose. Well, tell us a little bit more about what you're trying to achieve with Rebalance Earth. It is, it is, as we've discussed already, a very novel approach to investment and uh the use of private capital. Um, but yeah, why why now for Rebalance Earth?

SPEAKER_01 11:08

Yeah, so um maybe just to kind of step back on on my career. So, you know, I the bulk of my career has really been around pensions, which is you know, how do we save money today to make sure we have enough money when we retire, right? It's a it's the ultimate in long-term thinking that you know, when you're 25, you put away a little bit of money so that when you're 65 or 70, you you you have enough to retire on. So it requires a completely different long-term mindset of 40, 50 years, which is very difficult, different to political time cycles and very different to company time cycles that are typically all about quarterly and and annual results. So there's a sort of mindset philosophical approach. The second point is that pension fund capital has been used to fund a lot of infrastructure around the world. So, you know, the M6 toll road was actually funded by Australian pension funds. Uh and, you know, when I was a pension fund consultant, uh, I was involved back in 2010 in the early days of renewables and getting pension funds to invest in offshore wind and solar panels, which has you know been a key part of the energy transition. And so I think this long-term pool of money is an important building block in terms of like how do we transition to this kind of more resilient country that we all want to we want to talk about. And the the second point in terms of why now is a lot of these pension funds, despite the political discourse coming from you know the US of being anti-climate change, anti-ESG, they are increasingly aware that climate change and nature loss is a clear and present danger in a tangible time horizon. So let me just give a couple of just hard-hitting sort of facts and figures, just as a bit of a wake-up call. So the first is the institute uh and faculty of actuaries, uh, so these are the people who guess you know who who figure out how long people will live and help calculate insurance and all the rest, uh, have done some research and analysis, and they think up to 25% of global GDP is at risk in the next 25 years. Now I started my career 25 years ago, and so you know, the next 25 years in the context of a pension fund is around the corner. And just just a 25% of GDP, uh to put that in context, in the global financial crisis, which I live through, you know, GDP fell by about six or seven percent, and that felt terrifying. In COVID, it fell by 11%, but fortunately it sort of bounced back very quickly. So 25% is seriously bad for any investments you're making. It's also bad for the members that you that you're trying to take care of. Linked to that, Naugious, which is the second largest pension fund and asset owner on the planet with you know over a trillion dollars uh invested, uh, looked at the sort of climate models that a lot of people use and said, these are too linear, uh, they're not taking into account tipping points and sort of cascading impacts. And when we do do that, what how much of our US equity portfolio do we think could fall as a result of these? And and they think it's round numbers between 20 to 30 percent. And so once you start thinking about those, and if you're a pension fund trustee or CIO, you've got to say, well, actually, I can't just assume that when I invest in my equities and bonds, the past will be the same, the future will be the same as the past. And I need to start thinking forward and go, what if certain scenarios play out and how would I invest differently? And you know, the University of Exeter and United and the University Superannuation Scheme have done some brilliant work on sort of climate scenarios. The so what for your listeners is that these big pools of assets, these you know, 50 billion, 100 billion, up to a trillion dollar asset owners now see climate change and nature risk as systemic financial risks to their portfolios as well as risk to their members, and they want to do something about it. But in order to do something about it, they need to invest. And there's really sort of three things they can do. They can do sort of uh portfolio decarbonization, which is really how do they use their role as shareholders to engage with companies and say, what are you doing about it? And this is where uh stuff like TCFD and TNFD, which forces companies to recognize the both the impacts and risks to their business. The second thing is they can sort of invest in real-world decarbonization, and that, you know, historically that's meant investing in renewables, but increasingly they want to invest in portfolio resilience, which is how can they mitigate the risks, uh, the climate and nature risk to their portfolio? And the way they like to do that is invest. And so it was with this sort of insight and with this movement that we felt, and having spent my own time as a pension consultant as an asset owner, why not set up a rebalance earth to be a fund manager that invests in nature to provide resilience that positions nature as infrastructure, because it's probably the easiest way to conceptualize these multiple ecosystem services that Steve and I have been talking about. And crucially, if we can get companies to pay for those valuable ecosystem services, we make it an asset class and we make it investable, and we can start to channel money into it. And so part of our theory of change is if in the UK there's five trillion pounds worth of assets today across all of our pensions and wealth systems, and that will double in the next decade to 10 trillion, what if we could get them to invest just 2%? So just two pounds for every 100 pounds in nature as an asset class, that would be enough to close this funding gap that we need to provide the climate adaptation and the nature resilience that we need here in the UK over the next decade. So so yeah, so that's kind of why now and and why we set up rebalance Earth.

SPEAKER_02 17:14

Oh, it's absolutely fascinating, and I think there's so many different sort of threads that we could go on here. Um the phrase nature as infrastructure is a really interesting one. Steve, I'd be keen to bring you in here and to get your views on well, on that phrase, but also on um, I think the opportunity that that you know uh this this novelty and this use of pension capital um actually presents us in in the UK.

SPEAKER_00 17:45

Um taking the first point on uh on um infrastructure, nature infrastructure. I mean um the uh the teeth term green infrastructure has been used for quite a few years now, particularly within the urban context. And there's some fantastic examples of uh new uh urban green infrastructure. And I I and I and I think when Rob is is talking about the infrastructure, he's just extending that that framework to uh to wider across the landscape. Um and uh so we do see it as uh as essential infrastructure, you know, both in the rural and the urban. I uh uh picking up um on Rob's points as uh nature as a uh an asset class, uh uh which is I think is really novel and a step step fur forward from uh the work that's been going on for probably, and we've been involved in for some maybe 15 years now and longer on ecosystem services. Um what's really interesting is that this for me, and the and the bit that really excites me is that this is the opportunity to to scale up. Um, and uh, as I mentioned earlier, there is a limit to to the public purse. Um, and but the but the scale of challenge that we've faced, and I heard a really interesting phrase used in in the main news on the six o'clock news of climate chaos. It was a really interesting way to to describe this situation we're in. So the challenge we're facing, you know, and the climate pressures are really huge. But here, and this is what excites me here is an opportunity to to actually scale up uh and and be and a way to start meeting some of that, some of those challenges that we face, um, which will deliver a more resilient place, people and communities. Um, so that's I suppose my um well what it's why I'm excited uh you know at the moment that I'm still in my career at 40 years on uh and still enjoying um uh um they meeting the challenges. Definitely, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 20:10

Yeah, and you're right, it it's a huge opportunity and really exciting. And I think what I'd be keen to explore um the sort of final part of the podcast then is well, what what what does this mean tangibly? You know, what what are we talking about in terms of real-world examples that um you know we've spoke about there's an opportunity to scale up here at pace um with this sort of pension capital. So, well, what does that mean? What what sort of um solutions, nature-based solutions, opportunities can this type of funding um unlock? So uh Steve, I know we've been working on some of the flood and coastal resilience innovation projects. I don't know if you've got any case studies from that that you'd like to discuss and share. But equally, Rob, it'd be really good to hear your thoughts on um yeah, some of those real world examples.

SPEAKER_01 21:00

But can I, I mean, I just think you know, Manchester, you know, I I know JBA talk about resilient people, resilient places, really resilient landscapes, resilient assets, and resilient organizations. I think it's just so good to bring it to life. And I and I think so. Take take Manchester and take Dove Stone, which is uh Peatland to the kind of uh east of Manchester. Let's think about some of the problems that happened. So the A57 is a main route to move people, goods and services between Manchester and Sheffield. So it's an important part of the UK's economy. That road closes down because of flooding and also because of wildfires. When we get wildfires, that puts pressure on the Manchester Fire Brigade who has to go and put it out. When there are these wildfires, not only does it stand Road and impact our economy. A few days later, a few weeks later, the local NHS will see a spike in patients who have respiratory issues. I love sphagnum moss. Spagnum moss cleans water, it stores water, so it helps with flooding, it helps with drought. When it's there, it reduces that wildfire risk, it improves biodiversity, it also sort of sequesters carbon. And so, how do we move from a model where at the moment the RSPB on just philanthropic money is just repairing a little bit or restoring a little bit of it to go at scale and go, what if we restored thousands of hectares of dovestone, restored sphagnum moss, reduced that wildfire risk to the A57, reducing pressure on the NHS, reducing pressure on Manchester Fire Brigade, cleaning the water, meaning that United Utilities has to pay for less water treatment, meaning that the reservoirs which are almost running out of water around there are more resilient in these summer months, at the same time reducing the flood risk to the A57 and the surrounding area. And so that for me, that is a great example of the multiple ecosystem services that nature provides, the opportunity to do it at scale, the multiple beneficiaries in a real sort of place-based thing. And then what needs to be done that hasn't been done is new ways of contracting to make sure that all of the people who benefit start to pay for those ecosystem services. And the exciting thing is that we can get pension funds like the West Yorkshire Pension Fund, like Greater Manchester Pension Fund, who say, Yeah, we want to invest in that. We're prepared to make the upfront capital today to fund those changes and then get paid over time for this transformation.

SPEAKER_00 23:57

Yeah, that's a terrific example, Rob. Particularly where the police, NHS services, the fire services are all uh are all challenged by these uh sort of our sort of less resilient landscapes, you know, through um these weather extremes. And Manchester, in fact, was very badly affected by the by the big burn on the on the moors. And I can remember being in Manchester city centre, and the the fire, the fires on Suddleworth Moor are well like 15-20 miles away, but you could still smell it in the air in Manchester.

SPEAKER_01 24:43

And then scaling it up, it's then going, well, how do we rewiggle and restore the oh well? We've already got Mayfield Park, which for me is one of the best examples of sustainable urban drainage, the sort of green infrastructure that Steve talked about in Manchester City Center, uh, that it that is protecting people. And we we we know uh you know, we the point is that we've got this shifting baseline. So the floods that we've seen in 2025 and more recently, these worldfars, you know, the people who listen to this podcast know sadly that in the next 10 years it's gonna be worse. That everything that we've experienced in the last few years is is going to be worse in the next 10 to 15 years. And it has huge impact on people's lives, it has impact on people's jobs, it has impact on the local economy, and then obviously because it's happening all over the UK, it has an impact on the UK economy. And so I think the the job is to create like how do we create this sort of vision and theory of change where we can start to integrate investing in nature alongside grey, so it's a sort of grey, green, blue as well. I don't want to focus, I don't want to forget about coastal and under the sea, because I think you know that it's easy to talk about flooding and fires, but there's a huge amount on the coast that we should do. But I just think it requires a mindset shift, it requires new new partnerships, you know, you know, the you know, the emerging partnership between Rebalanced Earth and JBA, you know, we need United Utilities to work with Network Rail, to work with National Highways, to work with GMCA, the Greater Manchester Combined Authority, to work with Greater Manchester Pension Fund. And then we need all of the kind of consultancies and enablers, the JBAs of this world, uh, the rebalance earths of this world to work together to fund this new critical infrastructure. Uh and and what I would say is we just don't have time. We need to kind of get on with it and and and start doing this at pace. And I think what we need to socialize is what all of the knowledge and experience that each one of these actors has accumulated over the last decade in their own silos, and we now need to make them and make them available so we can put them all together and go, yes, we can have confidence that when we do this intervention, it's gonna run reduce flood peaks by 25% or 30%. We we have confidence that these nature-based solutions work. And I know I know you guys have done fantastic work there.

SPEAKER_02 27:09

Well, and and that I was just gonna come in there because um you're you're you're right. I mean, the the the the opportunity is is is fantastic here. And I think the Manchester examples that you've just spoken about there have been have been have been super. And Steve, just to sort of close then, um, there have been many great examples, I think, of where JBA, as Rob rightly says, have been involved in the design and delivery of nature-based solutions. And it is also about innovation, isn't it? It's about moving the frontier on, developing uh novel solutions for um people, places, assets, landscapes, and organizations, so we can build you know resilience to climate change. But was there one particular standout example that is relevant here for you?

SPEAKER_00 27:54

Um, I suppose the um I mean Mayfield Park, um, Rob just mentioned there is a is a really interesting piece of urban work creating a new sizable park in the centre of Manchester. I mean, we were fortunate enough to be involved in that. I mean, the the medlock that flows through it was uh basically underground for much of it, and so it's been daylighted, it's created reconnected the medlock and created uh a new area of sort of floodplains, so it actually does have flood risk value there. Um it's you know it's created completely new habitats in the in the medlock there. Um and that park is is you know it's a it's a wonderful and sort of treasured part of the city centre now. So I'd get I'd certainly go along with with Robon or in the urban area. I think the intro some interesting work we've been doing on the um on the resilience fronts, on the flood risk resilience fronts, uh with the with the pilots, the oozwem project in North York York. That's that's a really interesting project that um sought two things uh to to connect York, which everybody knows floods frequently and quite deeply, um, with the upper catchment, because it's quite clear that any interventions and changes in land management um in in the upper catchment would have a knock-on effect down in Thames. So there's a there's a an interesting piece there of that project is to just reconnect the people of York and the community of York with because they're intimately linked with the communities in the upper catchments. So that that's really a sort of interesting piece. And I and the interest and uh and doing the work in the upper catchments with the yore, the the swell, and the nid, those interventions they don't just help your weigh down the system. There are small communities and towns all the way down that catchment that will will benefit from sort of the activities of uh NFM activities, natural flood management, sort of actions and activities and and changes in land management in that upper catchment. So it isn't just one community, you know, uh it's multiple communities along there. And I I it's that sort of integrated sort of um approach. And when we talked about multiple benefits earlier, I and those benefits, it's the same benefit, but it cascades all the way down the system. So I think that's um a sort of a good example of where nature-based solutions in one part can have not can deliver that same benefit but all the way down the carpet, uh down the catchment.

SPEAKER_02 30:48

Yeah, thank you. Yeah, thanks, thanks, Steve. I think you're you're absolutely right. Well, look, it's been a really inspirational conversation, and I suppose I'd like to finish on a very inspirational note. So I'm really interested then in briefly what your individual um visions are for the future of nature-based solutions. Um, Rob, let's come to you first on that one.

SPEAKER_01 31:12

Yeah, I I love the uh Blue Origin uh sort of quote or mantra or step by step ferociously. So last week we launched a £25 million cornerstone fund, and we're going to start funding in the next six months nature-based uh projects like the ones we talked about, where we will get paid by companies for nature because they want to and need to and not because they're told to. And that and that becomes part of our kind of theory of change. Think about how the Rocket Railway transformed the way we thought about transformation, you know, transportation. At the end of the year, we're going to raise uh £150 million and do that. And then the goal in the next two to three years is raise a billion. And you know, our goal in the next decade is to scale up to 10 billion and hopefully crowd in lots of other fund managers. We don't want to be the only fund manager. We would love it that this is now an established asset class that pension funds invest in. It's a £100 billion asset class, challenging, challenging, channeling money into nature here in the British Isles, providing climate resilience, improving nature and biodiversity, and just making the UK just a much nicer place to live in. So yeah, that's that's our plan for the rest of the year and for the next 10 years.

SPEAKER_02 32:28

Hugely inspirational and um really great place to finish. But Steve, uh final uh thoughts from you.

SPEAKER_00 32:36

I think on that same picking up on that same theme, I I think what Rob is doing uh and the uh in developing a uh sort of it's well it's pioneering and I think with him I I it I I'd like to see it grow uh and um and be able to scale up this work um so we can really make a difference. Um and I think that's I suppose my vision for the future.

SPEAKER_02 33:15

Thanks, thanks, Steve, and thanks to both of you. It's been a really um fascinating conversation, it's been a really inspirational conversation, and I think um I've been really sort of you know um uh touched by I suppose what this real potential and opportunity is that's in front of us. So I will be watching with enormous interest, um Rob uh on the progress that Rebalance Earth uh can make with the opportunity. And so look, we've reached the end of our time today. As always, if you've enjoyed listening, then please hit the subscribe button so you're ready for our next episode in a month's time. Till then, thanks for joining us. I'm Phil Emonson, and you've been listening to the Climate Resilience Podcast brought to you by JBA Consortions.