A Scorecard Approach to the Environment
The Australian Conservation Foundation’s (ACF) 2025 Election Scorecard doesn’t pull punches. (1) It hands the Coalition a historically low score of 1 out of 100 for its environment and climate policies. Labor fares little better with 54%, a mere pass, while the Greens (as you would expect) top the table with 98%. These are headline numbers—designed to prompt voters—but for investors, they tell a deeper story about risk, opportunity, and where future returns are likely to emerge. This blog isn’t a political statement. It’s an investment perspective grounded in the data and recommendations laid out in the ACF’s National Agenda for Australia’s Nature and Climate (2). It is also important to note here that the ACF, founded in 1965, is a non-profit organisation that advocates for stronger environmental protection, climate action, and nature restoration across Australia.
Nature and Climate Risk Is Financial Risk
According to the report over 49% of Australia's GDP—around $896 billion—is directly dependent on nature. That includes agriculture, tourism, real estate, and insurance. Every hour, Australia loses the equivalent of 28 Sydney Opera Houses in threatened species habitat. In just the past 25 years, more than seven million hectares of habitat have been destroyed. According to the ACF, these aren't just environmental problems. They're financial vulnerabilities.
To be fair, asset managers and super funds are increasingly recognising this. Biodiversity loss can affect asset valuations, trigger regulatory interventions, disrupt supply chains and reshape markets. That’s why frameworks like the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) are gaining global traction. The ACF’s Agenda aligns with this evolution in thinking. It argues for mandatory nature disclosures, traceable supply chains, and sector-specific plans to halt and reverse nature destruction. These are not radical ideas. They are preconditions for sustainable investment.
Scorecard Signals: The Mispricing of Environmental Policy
The ACF’s scorecard isn't about partisanship. It evaluates alignment with an independently developed policy framework: four overarching goals, 16 measurable outcomes, and 54 evidence-based tests. The fact that no major party fully aligns with it is telling. Labor scores moderately thanks to progress on renewables and rejecting nuclear power, but loses ground for continuing coal and gas approvals. The Coalition's one-point showing stems solely from acknowledging risks linked to importing high-level nuclear waste under the AUKUS pact.
Investors should interpret this not as ideology but as mispricing. If governments are out of step with the trajectory of global capital—moving away from fossil fuels and towards nature-positive portfolios—it creates volatility. Markets eventually correct mispricings. The smart money gets in ahead of that.
Nature Restoration Is Not a Cost—It’s an Economic Driver
The ACF proposes a bold investment agenda:
$1.9bn annually to restore 30% of degraded native vegetation over the next 30 years
$1.3bn annually to protect threatened species
$5bn to create new protected areas across public, private and Indigenous-managed landACF012_NationalAgendaDo…
According to them, this isn't charity. It's stimulus. Restoration work is labour-intensive, regionally distributed and has high local multiplier effects. It creates jobs, strengthens ecosystems that underpin agriculture, and reduces future disaster recovery costs. Every dollar not spent on climate resilience today will likely need to be spent threefold in the future.
Moreover, these investments support Australia's global obligations—particularly under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which commits signatories to conserve 30% of land and sea by 2030.
Fossil Fuel Subsidies: A Structural Headwind
When reading the ACF National Agenda, Australia still spends around $20,000 per minute subsidising fossil fuel projects. That’s more than the average annual wage, handed out in minutes to industries with declining long-term value. Redirecting just a fraction of these subsidies could underwrite the transition to renewables, accelerate habitat restoration, and drive regional job growth in future-focused sectors like clean manufacturing and regenerative agriculture.
In short, there's a compelling reallocation argument. Current policies artificially inflate the competitiveness of coal and gas while undercapitalising the systems—natural and economic—we need for resilience. From a portfolio perspective, that creates risk exposure that isn’t being properly priced in.
Renewables: The Asset Class That Keeps Compounding
Clean energy now makes up 40% of power in Australia's main grid. Solar PV is on over 3.5 million rooftops. According to the report, last year alone, Australia added nearly 6GW. The shift is already underway, and yet the opportunity gap remains wide.
The ACF supports accelerating the renewable rollout to reach 94% clean power by 2030. They believe it is feasible, given Australia's sun and wind advantage. It’s also commercially sensible: renewables are now cheaper to build and operate than coal or nuclear. Nuclear, in contrast, is ranked last in investor surveys for long-term returns. It’s not just expensive—it’s also slow, water-hungry, and politically divisive. That makes it a poor fit for private capital and an unwise policy pivot.
Regulatory Certainty Will Be the Gamechanger
Markets reward clarity. The ACF’s Agenda calls for enforceable national environmental standards, an independent national protection agency, and climate-aligned emissions targets. In their eyes, these proposals reduce regulatory risk and improve market transparency. They’re pro-investment, even if they appear anti-incumbent.
For superannuation funds, insurers, infrastructure investors and private equity firms, the implications are clear. The transition isn’t a binary choice between growth and environment. The future is one where environmental policy will shape financial returns. Governments dragging their feet may win short-term favour from legacy industries. But capital, increasingly, is voting for nature.
The Bottom Line
Nature is not a side issue—it is foundational to the functioning of the economy. The ACF’s 2025 scorecard may have been designed for voters, but its message to investors is equally sharp: the policy landscape is shifting, and alignment with nature-positive outcomes is becoming a proxy for long-term risk management.
Investing in nature isn't charity. It's strategy. The cost of inaction is rising. And the upside of leading the transition—to clean energy, to restored ecosystems, to regenerative business—is growing.
This isn’t about politics. It’s about recognising where the momentum, capital and opportunity are heading. Nature is the next frontier of investment. And the market knows it.
References
Australian Conservation Foundation “ACF election scorecard: from abysmal to amazing” 15 April, 2025 https://www.acf.org.au/acf-election-scorecard-from-abysmal-to-amazing
Australian Conservation Foundation “A National Agenda for Australia’s Nature & Climate” April 2025 https://www.acf.org.au/community-hub
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