Various environmentalists have tried this in the US. Here's a reason article about several attempts: https://reason.com/2019/11/18/why-dont-environmentalists-jus... Kind of frustrating the OP's article doesn't actually do any research on why it's hard to actually do this "clever" idea. There is an actual power structure that is opposed to these sorts of actions!

In general in the US it's very difficult to do this on state/federal land. You usually must make use of your rights or the leases will be revoked. Even when there is a state like Idaho where you can buy grazing rights and supposedly not use them, the state bureaucracy isn't interested in it.

I guess you could do this with coal rights but the coal markets have been so bad for the last decade it's hard to see this as worth doing.