Climate change and environmental degradation are no longer matters of hypothetical concern or social conscience for many companies, but day-to-day operational risks. Businesses across sectors are trying to function in places where natural systems are unraveling under pressure. Stormwater systems built for a different era are failing during routine rainstorms. Heat is stressing energy systems and endangering employee health (while increasing employer insurance costs). Degraded watersheds—the lands and streams that collect and carry our water—are threatening clean, reliable water supplies. These aren’t distant threats. They’re direct challenges to continuity, cost management and workforce stability, and they’re forcing companies to rethink what counts as a core business investment.
Nature-based projects are increasingly functioning less as corporate social responsibility initiatives and more as basic infrastructure for long-term resilience and employee health. For example:
And these investments in nature are often far more effective than engineering fixes that are applied too late and at much greater expense.
Along with the direct impacts on business operations, communities are also demanding more accountability from major employers when local systems fail or are threatened (witness the mounting community concern over data centers). In an environment where both risk and scrutiny are mounting, companies that invest early and proactively in the lands, resources, and natural systems around them aren’t just meeting sustainability targets or burnishing green credentials. They’re creating opportunities to deliver co-benefits for people and the planet. They’re protecting continuity, reducing exposure, and strengthening the places where their workforce, customers and wildlife live.
Nature-based solutions can deliver strong returns, but only when they’re planned and executed with scientific rigor. Poorly designed projects can underperform or even create new problems. Since such projects are long-term investments, they need to be justified to investors as measurable and based on science, meeting the key due diligence thresholds. That’s why companies need the support of deep scientific expertise, local knowledge, and a track record of long-term stewardship.
Organizations that are embedded in communities and have expertise in ecology, hydrology, land management, forestry, and climate science can help ensure that projects have viable targets and are more likely to succeed. My organization has done some of its most productive work thanks to the support of companies that have recognized the tangible benefits of tapping into the expertise of conservationists.
In one example, a global beverage company worked with us to build supply chain resilience by addressing nature-related risks across the landscapes that support its business. As water stress and land degradation began to affect key sourcing and production regions, the company focused on strengthening the natural systems that underpin reliable operations — particularly in river basins and agricultural areas critical to its value chain.
That work spanned multiple geographies and priorities, from restoring stressed watersheds through collective action with other water users, to supporting more resilient agricultural practices tied to core crops. By grounding decisions in local science and collaborations, the company was able to reduce uncertainty, plan more confidently for the long term, and reinforce the stability of the places it depends on — demonstrating how investing in nature can directly support business continuity while also benefiting communities and ecosystems.
This kind of strategic relationship illustrates a broader shift already underway. Businesses are increasingly viewing nature — land, water, forests, and the climate—as essential components of risk management, not as optional environmental work on the side.
For much of the private sector, that shift is still new. Working with nonprofit and public organizations that have spent decades managing landscapes and ecosystems offers a practical way to move faster, reduce uncertainty, and avoid costly missteps as environmental pressures intensify.
Bill Ulfelder is Executive Director of The Nature Conservancy in New York, where he works at the intersection of nature, infrastructure, and risk in one of the most complex economic environments in the world to deliver on the organization’s vision of a world with a livable climate, healthy communities and thriving nature. He leads efforts to use science and policy to help communities and businesses navigate flooding, heat, water, and other climate-driven challenges.
