Nature Finance UK Review 2025 published: Key insights into a growing project pipeline

EKN

5 January 2026

Private sector interest in the environmental outcomes delivered by restored land and water continues to grow across the UK. From voluntary markets for carbon removal and flood risk reduction to the expanding compliance market for Biodiversity Net Gain in England (and proposals in Scotland), nature finance is becoming an increasingly important part of the UK’s green economy.

In response to this rapid evolution, the Ecosystems Knowledge Network (EKN) in association with Kana Earth has published the Nature Finance UK Review 2025, our second in-depth assessment of the UK’s nature finance project pipeline.

Building on the 2023 Review, the 2025 edition provides an updated picture of how nature finance projects are developing across the UK, including their readiness to trade, routes to market, and access to enterprise support. The Review draws on evidence from hundreds of place-based projects led by land and coastal managers seeking to generate income through nature markets.

Key takeaways from the Review include:

• A diverse but maturing pipeline: The UK nature finance pipeline spans carbon, biodiversity, flood risk reduction and other ecosystem services, with woodland and peatland carbon projects still dominant in terms of scale and value.
• Strong regional concentration: England and Scotland host most projects, while Northern Ireland remains under-represented and smaller landholdings pose challenges in Wales and Northern Ireland.
• Growing ambition, limited readiness: While many projects aim to stack multiple environmental outcomes, relatively few are yet successfully trading, reflecting both market immaturity and complex buyer requirements.
• Barriers to scale and replication: Challenges remain around scalability, discoverability, governance and geographical reach – highlighting the need for clearer market signals, stronger demand, and improved support for project developers.

As nature markets continue to expand, understanding the supply of projects, and the barriers they face, is critical for policymakers, investors, market intermediaries and practitioners alike.

Read the Nature Finance UK Review 2025 to explore the full findings, evidence and insights, and to better understand how the UK’s nature finance pipeline is evolving: