Moderating the panel, Dr Geronimo Gussmann, Advisor on Nature-based Solutions at the UNEP-CCC, underlined that policy signals now favour NbS. More than half of updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement mention nature-based measures, yet few specify urban cooling. Meanwhile, the Kunming–Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) commits Parties to expanding green and blue spaces in cities by 2030 (Target 12). “The alignment is there with Paris for climate and the GBF for biodiversity. The next step is to align money and municipal action,” Gussmann stressed. He also advocated blended finance to pull adaptation, biodiversity, and health budgets into single NbS pipelines, and pointed to UNEP-CCC’s Business Models for Financing Nature-Based Solutions in Urban Climate Action as a useful framework for supporting cities in developing tailored financing approaches.
Architect Richard Hassell, co-Founder of WOHA, shared a practitioner’s vision of weaving nature into city architecture. Hassell, known for pioneering green building projects in tropical cities, showcased how “urban architecture and passive cooling can go hand-in-hand.” He described a paradigm shift from seeing buildings as isolated boxes to acknowledging them as living parts of the urban ecosystem. “High-rise greenery is not just for the building’s occupants, but performs environmental services for everyone,” Hassell explained. “Plants filter air pollution, provide shade, block out noise, absorb heat, and even create habitats for birds and insects.”. Hassell called for updating building codes and incentives, so that features like green roofs, vegetated facades, courtyards, and permeable, reflective materials become standard practice in development. With successful examples now in place from Singapore to Milan to Bogotá, architects and planners have a growing toolkit to design climate-resilient buildings that stay cool naturally.
Bringing a policy perspective, Eva Gurría, Partnerships Lead at the NBSAP Accelerator, focused on mainstreaming urban NbS through national biodiversity strategies and climate plans. Too often, she noted, countries address heat adaptation in one silo and urban greenery in another. “We need to break silos. Think of urban nature as infrastructure,” she urged. Gurría pointed to London’s natural-capital accounting, where every £1 spent on parks yields £27 in health, environmental and social benefits, all proof that robust valuation can unlock budgets. The Accelerator’s matchmaking facility now links similar city-level cooling proposals with national ministries and financiers, requests already span Antigua and Barbuda to Zimbabwe.
Closing the panel session, Dr Zahra Jandaghian, Nature-Based Solutions Lead at the National Research Council of Canada’s Construction Research Center, made the engineering case for NbS. Her team’s modelling shows that combinations of reflective cool roofs, increased urban tree canopy, and ventilated street canyons can cut peak temperatures by up to 4 °C, and reduce building energy demand by double digits in Canadian cities. “If we can measure it, we can finance it,” she said. Embedding these measures into building and planning codes will give developers certainty and insurers confidence. Jandaghian sees potential in resilience bonds and green sukuk that reward verified reductions in heat-related mortality or energy consumption, plus public “ecosystem-service payments” for projects that deliver social value beyond property lines.
