Implementing nature-based solutions requires distinguishing place from space

Nature-based solutions (NbS) scholarship is overshooting its most basic purpose—the implementation of NbS projects. Investment in high-level design is outpacing the practical realities of implementation. While expert-driven approaches are useful for project prioritization at landscape scales, all NbS projects are implemented in real places, inhabited by human and non-human lives. Projects span multiple properties, impact resident livelihoods, and affect and are affected by local and regional ecological dynamics. In the excitement of novel technical top-down NbS designs, equal attention is needed for ground-up social–ecological contexts of locales. Using geographers’ conceptual distinction between space and place , we outline a place-based inquiry useful for assessing site-level ecological and social feasibility to advance implementation. We identify implementation barriers, routes for top-down and bottom-up integration and call for case studies detailing implementation challenges and remedies. Integrating remote-spatial and place-based data enables contextualizing design—saving time and money and consequently increasing successful implementation.