Double Nature Summit

Planning for regeneration and natural
carbon restoration at scale

STAY IN THE LOOP!

Co-organized by

STAY TUNED!

After this year’s success with the first Double Nature Summit, we will gather again next year! Stay in the loop!

SIGN UP FOR UPDATES!

STAY TUNED!

After this year’s success with the first Double Nature Summit, we will gather again next year! Stay in the loop!

SIGN UP FOR UPDATES!

RECAP: 4 days of collective inspiration and action to double nature

The Double Nature Summit is a 4-day participatory platform bringing together a diverse range of stakeholders, including regenerative pioneers, investors, scientists, businesses, policymakers, non-governmental organizations, indigenous people, and local communities. Based on Paul Hawken’s Drawdown and Regeneration, and many others, our common goal is to double nature – applying regenerative practices to re-store carbon dioxide in the land and oceans. We think this can be done best with entrepreneurial drive and distributed scaling and we work towards a regenerative economy with which we can live in fairly distributed prosperity within planetary boundaries.

Learn about current ecosystem challenges, get inspired by pioneers and innovations, exchange knowledge and expertise, grow collaborations, and contribute to the design of new initiatives that help nature grow twice as big and strong. Join the community of regenerators!

This graphic recap by Priska Lang is a great entry point into what happened over the four days!

Dive deeper with the recording of Lyla Junes Keynote on the summit’s central idea – humanity as a keystone species – and her essay “Reclaiming our Indigenous European roots”.

Double Nature Plan

Over the course of the 4 days, we worked towards concrete actions to Double Nature and collected them into the Double Nature Plan. See whats there, get engaged, and submit your own projects!

Impressions

Who was there

Domain-Specific Conferences (May 22 – 24)

Each year, the Double Nature Summit aims to drive action across all possible domains of nature based solutions: on land, in the oceans, via rock weathering and with bio-based construction. Participate in one of the Domain-Specific Conferences to:

Network with fellow pioneers, get up to date with recent practices and scientific findings and share expertise.
Gain an in-depth understanding of current barriers to scaling nature-based solutions within your sector, and work towards solutions together.
Understand what business cases we can base ourselves on to implement nature-based solutions and double nature.

Insights from these days will feed into the Double Nature Day. Each domain has its unique program. Read more on the Sector-Specific Conferences below.

The Double Nature Day: Connection, Integration, Action (May 25)

Join the Double Nature Day, uniting all the domains and beyond. Get a comprehensive overview of the state of the regenerative economy with reports from the domain-specific conferences and keynotes. Gain skills and knowledge in in-depth workshops focused on your role in the system and work towards implementation in act-shops. Connect and network with your fellow regenerators – pioneers, entrepreneurs, investors, policymakers, and all the other change agents.

Curious? Explore the program and speakers below!

The 2023 Programme

Construction Day
Ocean Day
Land Day
Rock Weathering Day
Double Nature Day

Programme

On the Constructions Focus Day, we will discuss and accelerate the Material Transition in construction, based on the principles of Regeneration and Carbon Design. This day will be held in Dutch.

10:00 Walk in, welcome

10:30 Plenary opening, introduction to Regeneration, Carbon Design, and the Gideon philosophy, mission and vision

11:00 What is being done already?
Global Warming Potential (GWP) legislation (Gideon)
Creating biobased value chains (Building Balance)
Construction Stored Carbon (Climate Cleanup)
Other projects in three Carbon Design categories

12:30 Lunch + ‘Walk in the Park’

14:00 Collective action & co-creation to accelerate existing initiatives across:
1. Prevention (don’t build)
2. Retain value (re-use)
3. Create value (biobased construction)

16:00 Plenary closing

17:00 Borrel & walk-in dinner guests

18:30 Gideons networking dinner

Programme

Recap

Oceans cover more than 70% of our planet and have taken up 25% of anthropogenic CO₂, making them a vital part of the climate system. There are several nature-based solutions that can help with sequestering carbon as well as increasing the biodiversity, food production and the water quality of our ocean. Seaweeds, with their wide variety and potential, were the main topic of the Ocean day, represented by The Seaweed Company, Hortimare, The Kelp Forest Foundation, Arbon Earth and Sinkit. We got transported to Bonaire, where we were introduced to the many challenges that mangrove restoration projects are facing (Sabine Engel), and to Germany, to learn about Carbon Dioxide Removal methods (Wanxuan Yao). When taking a look closer to home, we learned about the successful restoration of seagrass (Rijkswaterstaat) and the creation of reefs (Oyster Heaven, Reefy). We enjoyed all of this on the beautiful island of Texel, with the boat ride bringing us closer to the topic of the day.

You can find the speakers’ slides linked with their name below!

Program 2023

09:30 Ferry from Den Helder

10:00 Registration

10:20 Welcome and introduction by NIOZ and Climate Cleanup

10:30 Keynote – Gert Jan Reichart (NIOZ): Ocean Systems and Regeneration

10:45 Alexander Ebbing (Hortimare) – Insights in the full potential of oceanic seaweed farming – view presentation here

11:00 Xu Ben Zhang & Samantha Deane (Kelp Forest Foundation) – Giant Kelp Forests: establishing the carbon sequestration potential and biodiversity impact – view presentation here

11:15 Break

11:35 Elise Schuijtvlot (Rijkswaterstaat) – Seagrass restoration in the Netherlands – view presentation here

11:50 Sabine Engel (Stinapa) – Mangroves Bonaire – view presentation here

12:05 Natacha Juste (Oyster Heaven) – Restoring the ocean’s Keystone species: Oyster reef regeneration at scale – view presentation here

12:20 Magnus Wilner (Arbon Earth) – Algae – carbon sequestration with Oceanpods

12:30 Q&A: questions and discussion

12:45 Lunch

13:45 Keynote – Ben Wanxuan Yao (CDRmare): 10 Mt CO2 removal per year challenge – how to create options tailored for your country.

14:05 Pitches – innovators:

Daniel Balutowski (Sinkit) – Sargassum Seaweed – Carbon Source or Sink? – view pitchdeck here
Finian Moore (The Seaweed Company) – Seaweeds: Their role in decarbonisation and CDR – view pitchdeck here
Leon Haines (Reefy) – Living breakwaters for climate resilient coastal protection

15:00 Interaction in actshops: accelerating the regeneration of oceans

Gert-Jan Reichart – Potential of reefs
Ben Wanxuan Yao – CDR: from global to regional scale
Alexander Ebbing – Distributed farming of seaweed farming
Rob van Opdorp – Ocean Nature-Tech solutions – double nature via desalination of water

16:10 Recap from the focus group sessions

16:30 Closing & next steps

17:00 Ferry to Den Helder

Location: NIOZ, Texel. Address and route
We are grateful for NIOZ to provide their great location at Texel for the Ocean Day. Note: conference contributions are not used to cover location costs, but only to cover catering and the regeneration book.

Programme

Recap

The Land Day was postponed to the end of the year, due to the late and wet season which made it very hard for farmers – an absolute key group for this day – to participate.

If you want to be notified about the new date and program, sign up below!

Programme

Recap

At the rock weathering day we saw a tremendous increase in research showing the field clearly gains traction – at the first conference four years ago we had problems with filling the program, now we are challenged with letting everybody show their results.

We discussed research into the ins and outs of olivine weathering in marine and terrestrial environments, monitoring methodologies, potential analysis and feasibility studies in terms of net Co2 sequestration when taking energy usage for mining, grinding and transport into account as well as studies on the ecosystem effects of olivine application. In addition to laboratory experiments, there are now numerous field trials, and efforts to model the effects of olivine weathering are picking up, too.

This year Luna Geerts won the “Olaf Schuiling” award with her research into the feasibility of enhanced rock weathering as a carbon sequestration methodology.

The rock weathering day was organized by the lively community itself with Climate Cleanup as a supporting partner for organization. Many thanks to the organizing committee with Ingrid Smet, Maria-Elena Vorrath, Patricia Grasse, and Climate Cleanup and to Deltares for hosting us at their facility with the first olivine weathering field trial.

You can find the speakers’ slides linked with their name below!

Program 2023

08:30 Doors Open

09:00 Opening, Intro by Deltares

09:15 Mineralization in marine environments
– Andreas Oschlies – Best practice guide for ocean alkalinity enhancement (OA)
– Yubin Hu – Potential of olivine application on carbon sequestration in coastal area in China
– Rasesh Pokharel – Unlocking the Potential of Olivine Weathering for CO2 Sequestration and Dredged Sediment Management in the Port of Rotterdam
– Jakob Rønning – Enhanced Weathering of Olivine in Rivers for Carbon Dioxide Removal – view presentation here
– Michael Fuhr – Disentangeling natural and enhanced weathering of calcite and olivine in the Baltic Sea – view presentation here
– Isabel Mendes – Preliminary results of a field experiment on alkalinity enhancement, in intertidal environments
– Coffee break
– Benjamin Van Heurck – Ocean alkalinisation through enhanced silicate weathering in coastal areas: a long-term mesocosm study
– Luna Geerts – Is Coastal Enhanced Silicate Weathering Rock Solid? – A feasibility study
– Nicolás Sanchez –Low impact of ocean alkalinity enhancement on subtropical food web structure and production
– Gunter Flipkens – Acute bioaccumulation and chronic toxicity of olivine in the marine amphipod Gammarus locusta – view presentation here
– Grace Andrews – One year later: Preliminary findings from a field trial of Coastal Enhanced Weathering with olivine
– Plenary discussion and Q&A

12:45 Lunch

14:00 Mineralization in terrestrial environments
– Dirk Paessler – Project Carbdown – The theory and practice of measuring the speed of ERW in nature: our experiences with several MRV approaches – view presentation here
– Jos Vink, Deltares – Two-year field trials with olivine, with focus on Nickel toxicity combined with modelling study – view presentation here
– Arthur Vienne – Monitoring Basalt Enhanced Weathering: where is the alkalinity? – view presentation here
– Laura Steinwidder – Enhanced silicate weathering: Evidence of biota-induced carbon sequestration
– Emily te Pas – Assessment of the enhanced weathering potential of different silicate minerals to improve soil quality and sequester CO2 – view presentation here
– Harun Niron – Can plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria Bacillus Subtilis stimulate enhanced weathering of basalt?
– Coffee break
– Euripides P Kantzas – The enhanced weathering potential of the United States
– Carlos Paulo – Measuring CO2 Drawdown in Mine Wastes and Rock Powders: Implications for Carbon Removal Monitoring Techniques
– Liam Bullock – Geochemical carbon dioxide removal potential of Spain – view presentation here
– Reza Khalidy – Constraining the global capacity of ERW in croplands considering soil temperature and pH control on kinetics –view presentation here
– Elisabete Pedrosa & Matthew Clarkson – Monitoring and Policy for ERW trials in tropical Brazilian agriculture
– Plenary discussion and Q&A

17:30 Closing, Drinks

Recap

On this final day of the Double Nature Summit we gathered with entrepreneurs and scientists from the previous days and philanthropists, policy makers and civil servants, funders, people with indigenous perspectives, NGOs, and civil society to weave it all together. We explored the idea of humanity as a keystone species in a stewarding role,equipping fisherman to become seaweed farmers as a strategy for distributed scaling, critically reflecting on colonial structures and reclaiming our indigeneity, storytelling for regeneration, finding purpose in regenerative work and leading from that place, blended finance approaches for innovative regenerative approaches.

Questions arose such as: What can we learn from our indigenous ancestors about relating to the planet and how we view ourselves as part of a system way bigger than us? How can we set up our work so that we can find funding for the whole process of regeneration over a time scale of one generation (20 years) and for the social, democratic, inspirational, cultural, ecological returns as well? What are practical ways to build trust and communication among stakeholders so we can meaningfully use and care for the commons?

Program 2023

09:00 Celebrating the regeneration movement in the Netherlands

A warm welcome in the day, with moments to celebrate all together.

CELEBRATING LIFE

Climate Cleanup is……. We are three years 1500 Club Double Nature Ambassadors.
What has happened and what is ahead?

Sven Jense (Climate Cleanup)

ECOSYSTEM REGENERATION – BAMBOO ON THE RISE

The extraordinary and fast renewable plant bamboo is mainly common in Asian countries. But also in other continents and countries, the plant is on the rise. Like Europe and the Netherlands.

@ Joost Borneman (BambooLogic)
@ Sophie Wisbrun-Overakker (Doing Business, Doing Good)
@ Lars Hillewaere (Carbon Farmers)
@ Sven Jense (Oncra)

ECOSYSTEM REGENERATION – 4 DOMAINS 1 MISSION

Sector insights from the 4 domain-specific days: the state of regeneration in the Ocean, Rock Weathering, and Bio-based Construction.

@ Eelco Leemans (Oceans)
@ Pol Knops (Rock Weathering)
@ Sacha Brons (Bio-Based Construction)
@ Bart van Beuzekom (Land)

10:30 Workshops

Learn practical skills from in-depth workshops to achieve your regenerative goals. You can choose to join one of the following workshops:

BLENDING FINANCE: PHILANTHROPY AND EARLY INVESTING

Apply the principles of regeneration to the practice of finance. How can our financial system be redesigned inspired by the science of living systems?

@ Frank van Beuningen (PYM)
@ Michiel Toneman
@ Jarno van den Heuvel (Lucy)

REGENERATIVE LEADERSHIP
WITH PURPOSE

How can founders and their teams unleash their regenerative potential & accelerate their sustainable transformations by activating their purpose and creating nature positive impact?

@ Sophie Wisbrun-Overakker (Doing Business, Doing Good)
@ Victor Broers (The Navona Network)

ENERGY TO DOUBLE NATURE

Energy is needed for everything. How is energy integrated within the development of nature-based solutions?

@ Ruud Koornstra (National Energycommissioner, Chairperson Climate Cleanup, Stichting SCO)

DECOLONIZING OUR WORK IN REGENERATION

In this session, we invite you to emotionally connect to the experiences of Indigenous Peoples, who are defending life on earth with their own lives. We also go back to our own roots and connect with the wisdom of our ancestors while imagining what the future will look like if we truly transform our societies.

@ Martine Doppen (Reclame Fossielvrij)
@ Raki Ap (Ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken)

STORYTELLING FOR REGENERATION

Stories change reality. Stories form a culture. Change the Story uses storytelling to create a regenerative culture in the Netherlands, by presenting a regenerative future.
How can storytelling help to Double Nature? How do we tell that story? To whom? At what places? –Session in Dutch

@ Jeppe van Pruissen (Change the Story)

CREATING SELF GOVERNING COMMUNITIES

Many great initiatives have come to fruition because of one driving force, a visionary, entrepreneur… you name it. Yet when they step down the project windels down. By introducing the case study of Utopia Eiland we will discuss and investigate what is needed to create a self governing community which can move forward even when the instigator steps down.

@ Xavier San Giorgi (Stichting Weerwoud)

REGENERATIVE FINANCE AND THE GOVERNANCE LADDER

In this Workshop we will share with you in depth our lessons learned on new blended and regenerative finance en governance in the last 10 years in regions in the world.
What are the principles for the transition towards new blended and regenerative finance and governance?

@ Caroline van Leenders (RVO)
@ Dennis Kerkhoven (YesAndMore)

12:00 Morning Closing

12:30 Lunch

14:00 Keynote – Humanity as Keystone species

@ Lyla June Johnston (online)

15:00 Collaborate on Regenerative Actions – Actshops

How can we see, think and act in a way that respects and builds on the potential of the places we live in, while benefiting social and ecological systems? Through a series of Actshops, participants have the opportunity to collaborate on specific case studies provided by enterprises, aided by principles of regenerative community design. You can choose to work with one case study.

@Josine Bakkes (Architects of Communities)

CO-CREATING THE COMMONS

Voedselpark Amsterdam is an alternative to the outdated plans for a distribution center on the last fertile soil of Amsterdam. They aim to create an ecological living lab and regenerative food hub on 60 hectares, on the edge of Amsterdam.

Challenge: How might we create a commons mindset in politics and municipal governments?

@ Natacha Hulst (Voedselpark Amsterdam)
@Bonnie Chopard
(Inlandschap)

DOUBLE NATURE AND MANGROVES

Bonaire hosts the largest mangrove forest within all of the Dutch Caribbean. These forests provide immense biological, economical and cultural value to the island.

Challenge: How might we restore mangrove forests and the communities around them to preserve one of the most important and threatened ecosystems on the planet?

@ Eelco Leemans (Climate Cleanup) @ Sabine Engel (Stinapa)

BIO-BASED BUILDINGS STORE CARBON, SOCIAL AND DISTRIBUTED

Easy Housing co-creates circular-, regenerative and disaster-resilient homes in collaboration with communities in the Global South.

Challenge: How might we scale up our housing technology service through inclusive home financing and carbon credits?

@Niels van den Berge (Easy Housing)

WEAVING THE TRIBES OF EUROPE AND TURTLE ISLAND

Lyla’s doctoral research focused on exploring the ways in which pre-colonial Indigenous Nations shaped large regions of Turtle Island to produce abundant food systems for humans and non-humans.

Challenge: How might we weave together indigenous nations across turtle island and Europe?

@ Lyla June Johnston (Lyla June)

LIFETIME CARBON CLEANUP

All of us have benefitted from the use of fossil fuels. However, we now know this has enormous consequences for our planet.

There are changemakers they however are not being financed. How can we pay them for the service of cleaning up the climate and double nature?

Challenge: How can we make cleaning up lifetime emissions using nature-based carbon removal as normal as health care?

@ Bart van Beuzekom (Scave.World)

THE FUTURE MACHINE

The Future Machine is an exhibition showcasing the miracles of people, nature, and technology. An immersive meeting place for innovators, entrepreneurs, and creators. Right here at Tolhuistuin.

Challenge: How might we find business partners who want to showcase their work and co-create the Future Machine?

@Matthea de Jong (Tolhuistuin)

BE AN OCEAN FARMER

Current developments within seaweed farming, are opening up a whole new industry of low trophic oceanic agriculture. An immense potential for the good of the planet.

Challenge: How might we roll-out the oceanic agriculture industry, so that it maximizes positive impact, while also distributing its profit to as many people as possible?

@Alexander Ebbing (Hortimare)

RESTORE LANDSCAPES VIA LOING TERM PROCESS FUNDING

Commonland works all over the globe with a diverse range of partners to protect and restore landscapes and to build sustainable business cases which generate an income for local communities.

To be successful, landscape restoration takes 20 years. This means that Commonland focuses on funders who are willing to commit themselves for a longer period to fund local organizations, offices, and other overhead costs vs funders who are only interested in short-term projects and results.

Challenge: How can we act together to shift funder’s preference from short term project to long term process funding?

@Mariken van den Boogaard (Commonland)
@Eva Cappon (Commonland)

17:00 Launching “Pathways to Double Nature Plan”

Double Nature Actions, the DNA of our plan, are place-based, regenerative and systemic actions that contribute to doubling nature. Double Nature is a radically positive plan to reverse climate change. It is not about doing less, but about doing more. It brings health, restores carbon and regenerates life.

@Tijn Tjoelker, Climate Cleanup
@Hanny van Hout, Climate Cleanup

18:00 Drinks

Celebration of three years 1500 Club of Double Nature Ambassadors

Programme

On the Constructions Day, we will discuss and accelerate the Material Transition in construction, based on the principles of Regeneration and Carbon Design.
This day will be held in Dutch.

10:00 Walk in, welcome

10:30 Plenary opening, introduction to Regeneration, Carbon Design, and the Gideon philosophy, mission and vision

11:00 What is being done already?
Global Warming Potential (GWP) legislation (Gideon)
Creating bio-based value chains (Building Balance)
Construction Stored Carbon (Climate Cleanup)
Other projects in three Carbon Design categories

12:30 Lunch + ‘Walk in the Park’

14:00 Collective action & co-creation to accelerate existing initiatives across:
1. Prevention (don’t build)
2. Retain value (re-use)
3. Create value (bio-based construction)

16:00 Plenary closing

17:00 Borrel & walk-in dinner guests

18:30 Gideons networking dinner

Who you will meet on Construction Day

Recap

You can find the speakers’ slides linked with their name below!

Program 2023

09:30 Ferry from Den Helder

10:00 Registration

10:20 Welcome and introduction by NIOZ and Climate Cleanup

10:30 Keynote – Gert Jan Reichart (NIOZ): Ocean Systems and Regeneration

10:45 Alexander Ebbing (Hortimare) – Insights in the full potential of oceanic seaweed farming – view presentation here

11:00 Xu Ben Zhang & Samantha Deane (Kelp Forest Foundation) – Giant Kelp Forests: establishing the carbon sequestration potential and biodiversity impact – view presentation here

11:15 Break

11:35 Elise Schuijtvlot (Rijkswaterstaat) – Seagrass restoration in the Netherlands – view presentation here

11:50 Sabine Engel (Stinapa) – Mangroves Bonaire – view presentation here

12:05 Natacha Juste (Oyster Heaven) – Restoring the ocean’s Keystone species: Oyster reef regeneration at scale – view presentation here

12:20 Magnus Wilner (Arbon Earth) – Algae – carbon sequestration with Oceanpods

12:30 Q&A: questions and discussion

12:45 Lunch

13:45 Keynote – Ben Wanxuan Yao (CDRmare): 10 Mt CO2 removal per year challenge – how to create options tailored for your country.

14:05 Pitches – innovators:

Daniel Balutowski (Sinkit) – Sargassum Seaweed – Carbon Source or Sink? – view pitchdeck here
Finian Moore (The Seaweed Company) – Seaweeds: Their role in decarbonisation and CDR – view pitchdeck here
Leon Haines (Reefy) – Living breakwaters for climate resilient coastal protection

15:00 Interaction in actshops: accelerating the regeneration of oceans

Gert-Jan Reichart – Potential of reefs
Ben Wanxuan Yao – CDR: from global to regional scale
Alexander Ebbing – Distributed farming of seaweed farming
Rob van Opdorp – Ocean Nature-Tech solutions – double nature via desalination of water

16:10 Recap from the focus group sessions

16:30 Closing & next steps

17:00 Ferry to Den Helder

Who you will meet on Oceans Day

Recap

The Land Day was postponed to the end of the year, due to the late and wet season which made it very hard for farmers – an absolute key group for this day – to participate.

If you want to be notified about the new date and program, sign up below!

Who you will meet on Land Day

Recap

This year Luna Geerts won the “Olaf Schuiling” award with her research into the feasibility of enhanced rock weathering as a carbon sequestration methodology.

You can find the speakers’ slides linked with their name below!

Program 2023

08:30 Doors Open

09:00 Opening, Intro by Deltares

12:45 Lunch

17:30 Closing, Drinks

Who you will meet on Rock Weathering Day

Recap

Program 2023