Carbon credibility: How GeoAI strengthens the future of climate finance
Carbon markets were created to make climate action more scalable. By assigning financial value to emissions reductions and carbon storage,...
For years, biodiversity sat just outside the core of most corporate sustainability strategies. It was acknowledged but rarely measured, recognized but difficult to manage. That’s beginning to change.
Driven by frameworks like the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD), emerging regulations, and rising investor interest, biodiversity is becoming central to how businesses assess risk, opportunity, and long-term resilience. Companies are now being asked to understand and report not only on carbon footprints but also on how their operations intersect with ecosystems—what they take from nature and what they leave behind.
Yet as expectations grow, the tools for understanding biodiversity often fall short. While carbon can be counted in tonnes and tracked through models, biodiversity is less uniform. It varies by region, season, and by definition. Unlike emissions, its impacts are often invisible until the damage is already done.
This growing gap between expectation and capability is becoming one of sustainability’s next great challenges. Before companies can protect nature, they must first be able to see it.
Unlike carbon, biodiversity cannot be easily reduced to a single metric. It is a complex, context-dependent concept that encompasses everything from species richness and habitat connectivity to ecosystem health and land use. What constitutes a positive impact in one landscape may not apply in another. Although standards and frameworks are improving, there is still no universally accepted method to quantify biodiversity in a manner that is both meaningful and scalable.
This complexity renders measurement an ongoing challenge. Traditional methods—such as field surveys, ecological assessments, and certification schemes—are resource-intensive and often limited in their coverage. Most companies depend on indirect proxies, such as land use types or conservation area boundaries, but these can obscure significant changes that occur between audit cycles or outside designated zones.
Supply chains introduce additional challenges. Companies often source from regions with limited environmental oversight or poor data availability. Without clear visibility, it becomes nearly impossible to determine whether operations are contributing to biodiversity loss or supporting regeneration.
The result is a growing number of biodiversity commitments made with limited ability to track progress. Ambition is increasing, but the evidence base is still catching up.
Biodiversity loss is often framed as a slow-moving crisis, but for many organizations, the risks are already apparent. Operating without a clear understanding of nature-related impacts creates blind spots that lead to real consequences.
A company might source raw materials from a region experiencing rapid habitat degradation without realizing it. Alternatively, it may commit to protecting ecosystems while lacking the capacity to identify which ones are most at risk within its own supply chain. Without reliable data, even well-designed sustainability strategies can fail to prioritize the areas that need the most attention.
These gaps have reputational costs, particularly as stakeholders become more attuned to nature-related disclosures. They also carry compliance risks. Emerging frameworks such as TNFD and new EU regulations are pushing for more detailed reporting, often requiring data that companies do not yet have.
But perhaps the most overlooked cost is opportunity. Without visibility, companies miss the chance to act early, to prevent harm rather than respond to it, to support local restoration efforts that align with global goals, and to integrate biodiversity protection into the core of their business operations.
In short, ignorance doesn’t protect you. It simply delays your ability to respond.
To manage biodiversity effectively, companies need more than high-level commitments. They require a means to observe and understand what’s happening in the landscapes they influence, at a scale and frequency that matches the complexity of the systems they rely on.
GeoAI offers a route to that kind of visibility.
By combining satellite imagery and machine learning, GeoAI enables the monitoring of landscape-level indicators of biodiversity across extensive geographies. Tree cover, habitat fragmentation, hedgerows, vegetation loss, and encroachment patterns can all be tracked over time. This allows sustainability teams to detect changes, identify high-risk areas, and consistently monitor the effectiveness of conservation or restoration interventions.
Unlike traditional ecological surveys, GeoAI does not require boots on the ground at every location. It can complement expert knowledge by providing a broader, continuous view, filling in the gaps between site visits and supporting faster decision-making.
For companies aiming to align with nature-positive goals or prepare for nature-related disclosures, this type of spatial intelligence provides a crucial foundation. It transforms biodiversity from an abstract concept into something observable, actionable, and accountable.
Some organizations are already starting to build the systems necessary for biodiversity visibility. Their efforts provide a glimpse of how companies and public agencies can transition from commitments to measurable progress.
In the UK, the Rural Payments Agency has utilized geospatial monitoring to map hedgerows, trees, and biodiversity features across over 130,000 square kilometers of land. This national-scale effort replaces fragmented field data with a coherent view of how landscapes are evolving, supporting both policy design and on-the-ground stewardship.
The Nature Conservancy, in collaboration with Picterra, is applying GeoAI to map and monitor coral reefs across extensive marine areas. By automating the detection of coral formations from aerial imagery, the team can process vast amounts of data that would be impossible to analyze manually. This enables more accurate and timely tracking of reef health, informing conservation strategies and helping direct resources to where they are needed most.
These examples are not just about technology; they focus on building a foundation of trust. By fostering a shared understanding of where nature is thriving, where it faces threats, and how it evolves over time, organizations can meaningfully integrate biodiversity into their strategies, operations, and risk management.
Biodiversity is no longer a peripheral issue. It is becoming a defining challenge for companies navigating the next phase of sustainability, which is deeply tied to climate resilience, supply chain integrity, and long-term value creation. However, protecting nature requires more than ambition—it demands the ability to see what’s happening on the ground and to act accordingly.
GeoAI offers a practical, scalable way to clarify visibility. It helps organizations identify risks, track progress, and support ecosystems not just with words, but with data. As disclosure frameworks mature and expectations rise, this kind of insight will become an essential part of how companies demonstrate accountability.
What we choose to measure—and how we measure it—shapes the outcomes we achieve. If biodiversity is to be protected, it must first be made visible.
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