Episode 11: Unlocking Capital for Nature with Megan Reilly Cayten, Senior Investment Manager @ Climate Asset Management

Solving Climate, Naturally

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 Council of World Wildlife Fund. Her passion is climate restoration, with the goal of leaving our children a habitable planet.

In this episode, we touch on:

The specific opportunities and challenges around scaling natural climate solutions in emerging markets, and the importance of centering indigenous communities as partners and stewards

The power of the ocean as a climate lever, the climate impacts to oceans of absorbing incredible amounts of energy and heat, and the status of emerging methodologies to unlock seaweed as a form of at-scale carbon sequestration

Climate Asset Management’s mandate, how it addresses the unique dimensions of investing in NCS, and how NCS investing differs from conventional infrastructure and real asset opportunities

What’s required for making natural capital an asset class, the path to making nature-based projects bankable, and what’s needed to drive more investment into natural climate solutions

Why “nature is the new climate” - why nature and biodiversity considerations are as essential to our focus as addressing greenhouse gas emissions

Want to learn more? Check out these resources:

Nature is the New Climate (Megan Reilly Cayten, Environmental Finance)

The Economics of Biodiversity: The Dasgupta Review

Financing the Earth’s Assets: The Case for Mangroves (Earth Security)

Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures

France’s Article 29 on biodiversity disclosures and the UK’s 2021 Environment Act mandating that projects deliver a biodiversity net gain

“Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered” (E.F. Schumacher)

Episode recorded: February 1, 2022