Landowners who have spent years navigating the grid interconnection process for projects like solar or wind are now pivoting. As they near approval, they repurpose their valuable grid connection rights for data centers, which can generate significantly higher financial returns than the originally planned energy projects.

Traditional conservation methods, like establishing national parks, are deeply flawed by corruption. In the DRC's Virunga National Park, senior officers were reportedly involved in the illegal trade of minerals and wildlife. This creates an absurd situation where anti-trafficking agents are essentially training rangers to fight their own superiors' illicit businesses.

A formal quid pro quo arrangement where a hunter provides meat in exchange for land access is illegal. This law prevents the commodification of wild game, which must remain a public resource. Gifts are permissible, but a transactional agreement crosses a legal line.

Unlike most industries, the American hunting and fishing community lobbied to tax itself. An 11-13% excise tax on firearms, ammunition, and sporting equipment, combined with license fees, directly funds state wildlife agencies. This creates a self-sustaining model for conservation.

A Norwegian-backed project in the Congo Basin treats conservation like venture capital. It provides small grants (~$5k) to communities who pitch development ideas, like a pigsty or farm tools. In return for the seed funding, the community pledges to protect a portion of their forest from development, aligning financial prosperity with environmental protection.

San Francisco's non-profits are often paid based on the number of homeless individuals they serve. This creates a perverse financial incentive to maintain and manage the homeless population like a "flock" rather than pursuing solutions that would permanently reduce their numbers and, consequently, the NGO's funding.

While often romanticized, a widespread shift to pre-industrial, low-yield organic farming would be a climate disaster. The core environmental problem of agriculture is land conversion. Since organic methods typically produce 20-40% less food per acre, they would necessitate converting massive amounts of forests and wildlands into farmland, releasing vast carbon stores.

The Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) uses a clever economic design. It offers a small payment ($4/hectare) for existing forests but imposes a massive penalty ($400/hectare) for any destroyed. This focuses financial incentives on the margin, where deforestation actually occurs, making the program more cost-effective.

The popular idea that regenerative agriculture can reverse global warming by sequestering carbon in soil is mostly a fantasy. Measuring and verifying soil carbon is difficult, its permanence is questionable, and it's being used by corporate polluters to "offset" emissions through flawed carbon markets, distracting from real, proven solutions.