Bioneers 2026: Brett KenCairn Keynotes on Centering Life to Heal the Planet
Brett KenCairn, Founding Director of the Center for Regenerative Solutions, was invited to give the Bioneers 2026 Keynote Address: Nature-based Climate Solutions—Centering Life to Heal the Planet on March 27, 2026.
Brett KenCairn, founding Director of the Center for Regenerative Solutions, an early leader in community-based living systems regeneration, challenges the conventional understandings of the causes and solutions of climate change and its fixation on carbon and technology. He illustrates through both recent science and our own direct experience that it is the degradation of the living world that is at the center of both how we have destabilized the climate, and how we can solve not only the climate crisis, but also reverse biodiversity loss and regenerate healthy human communities. He shows that we are living on a planet operating at half its photosynthetic capability—illustrating both the dire reality of our current situation but also the foundation of hope.
Pointing to numerous examples of human communities reversing large scale landscape degradation—including the reversal of the Dust Bowl in the U.S. in the 1930s, the restoration of the Rhode Island-sized Loess Plateau in China in the 1990s, and examples of similar activities taking place around the world now—Brett points to our ability to build a global movement, community-by-community, to harness nature’s power to regenerate landscapes at a scale. Through coordinated community-based action, these efforts can stabilize climate, generate hundreds of millions of jobs, generate trillions of dollars in economic opportunity, reverse biodiversity loss, and reboot the biosphere’s productive capabilities.
Check out his insightful view on our climate, our planet, and how we all must get back to nature-based climate solutions - especially in the urban context.
More about the CRS Founding Director: Brett KenCairn, founding Director of the Center for Regenerative Solutions and Senior Division Manager for Nature-based Climate Solutions for the City of Boulder’s Climate Initiatives Department, has throughout his career supported community-based initiatives across the western U.S., particularly in rural, Native American, and other marginalized communities. He also co-founded several organizations, including: the Rogue River Institute for Ecology and Economy; Indigenous Community Enterprises; Veterans Green Jobs; and Community Energy Systems.