Brian Sheth on Clean Air, Clean Water and Saving the Planet

Climate change. An ever-growing list of endangered species. An increasingly polluted food and water supply. Self-made billionaire and conservationist Brian Sheth has made it his mission to save the world from what ails it: mankind. 

“The biggest challenge of my generation is to maintain some sense of ecological balance and [to ensure] that we have clean air and clean water for my kids and hopefully several generations after that,” Sheth told Worth magazine.

“If you look at something that’s going to impact all of the people on the planet—and disproportionately impact people who are used to a great standard of living, i.e. Americans—environmental degradation is number one on the list.”

How Brian Sheth Got Bitten by the Conservationism Bug

Originally from Massachusetts, Sheth spent his childhood exploring the forests of New England with his friend Wes Sechrest.

“His mother was a botanist,” recalls Sheth. “We grew up in a semirural part of New England in a little town called Acton, Massachusetts. There were a lot of hikes and nature walks and a lot of discussions around conservation and habitat preservation.”

After Sheth graduated with a degree in economics from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, he worked for a private equity company in San Francisco. He would eventually start his own private equity firm. In 2015, Forbes magazine called Sheth one of the wealthiest entrepreneurs under 40. His name also appeared on Forbes‘ 2021 list of the nation’s richest. 

While Sheth became a highly successful entrepreneur, Sechrest became a globally renowned biologist. Eventually, their friendship led to the establishment of the Austin, Texas-based Global Wildlife Conservation foundation in 2008, which has been rebranded Re:wild. 

The investment acumen Sheth possesses is being put to good use in his many philanthropic endeavors. The software wunderkind is now known for his incredible work in uplifting vulnerable communities, particularly children, and his many conservation and environmental efforts. 

How the Sheth Sangreal Foundation Is Creating Ripples of Change

The Sheth Sangreal Foundation was established by Sheth and his wife, Adria Sheth, to promote education and wildlife conservation. In addition to supporting environmental initiatives, the foundation supports educational initiatives. 

The Sheth Sangreal Foundation’s mission statement declares, “For our children, our planet and our well-being, to ensure no one stands alone while protecting life in a changing world.” Over the years, it has contributed significantly to protecting the environment and young people in need.

The Sheth Sangreal Foundation’s work has impacted more than 120,000 children worldwide and preserved 50,000 miles of forest. The organization has 430 projects and over 90 ongoing partnerships worldwide with like-minded organizations, governments, and local authorities. Furthermore, the foundation has raised more than $60 million to help save the planet and educate youth. 

As part of its charitable work, the Sheth Sangreal Foundation also contributed to constructing a multimillion-dollar campus for the Boys & Girls Club of the Austin Area (BGCAA). This nonprofit organization assists underprivileged children in Austin. In recent years, the number of children in poverty has increased dramatically in the city. In response, the Sheth Sangreal Foundation made the multimillion-dollar donation, mainly financing a new facility for the Boys & Girls Club. 

BGCAA opened the BGCAA Home Club on April 26, 2019. The facilities include sports venues, a library, a computer lab, an art studio, a recording studio, dance studio, and a STEM learning center.

Brian Sheth and Re:wild

Sheth founded Re:wild, formerly known as Global Wildlife Conservation, and is its chairman emeritus. The organization’s mission is to “Conserve the diversity of life on Earth, where all of life has value and can flourish: plant, animal and human. So we can retain, restore and revitalize our planet.” 

Environmental conservation is a good investment, and its return on investment can be measured in real dollars, according to Sheth. Besides clean air, water, and food — all essential — arable farmland and soil preservation are also directly beneficial to people. And Sheth has the business chops to achieve this. He said, “In a real dollar term, every billion dollars that we invest in environmental preservation has about a 110 x return.”

Oscar winner Leonardo DiCaprio co-founded the organization with Sheth, who currently serves as co-chair. Re:wild serves more than 50 countries and is dedicated to preserving ecosystems and wildlife. As a result of the organization’s efforts in 2020, 45 million acres of wilderness have been preserved, and 835 endangered species have been rehabilitated.

“We haven’t found another planet, yet, that has any life on it,” Sheth has said. “And the clean air that we breathe, the clean water that we drink, all the things that we sometimes take for granted come from the biodiversity that is on the planet.” 

Brian Sheth’s Plastic Sustainability Campaign

In 2021, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation launched an initiative focused on plastics sustainability. The Sheth Sangreal Foundation will fund this initiative, which helps businesses decrease their plastics impact and improve their plastics value chains.

Plastics circularity will be achieved through dialogues with innovators and investors. In addition, public awareness and action toward a solution will be raised through research and educational materials generated from these conversations.

According to Sheth, “The critical need for businesses all over the country is to identify a set of standard practices to guide safe and sustainable paths to reduce their environmental impact … This initiative, led by science, will bring public and private stakeholders — from Wall Street and government, including local officials, to the world’s largest network of conservation leaders — to the same table to solve this global issue.”

The gigantic task of “saving the world” cannot be done by one man alone, but Brian Sheth may be able to flip that fact on his head thanks to his and his counterparts’ enormous efforts and ability to connect with the right people to get things done. 

“Whether you’re rich or you’re poor, whether you’re American or Indian or Chinese, this is the one issue that’s going to affect all of us,” says Sheth. “The world is interconnected. I think that that’s the number one challenge of our time. And if you go to parts of the world where they’ve had tremendous environmental degradation, you do realize that it has a very, very large impact on the quality of life.”

Similar Stories